Undercover Boss: A Variation of the Employee Engagement Survey

Undercover Boss, which will begin its third season on CBS in early 2012, is a weekly TV show that follows senior-level executives as they leave their corporate office, disguise their identity, and work alongside line-level employees to evaluate the inner workings of their organization. Undercover bosses such as Joseph DePinto, President and CEO of 7-Eleven, and Bryan Bedford, Chairman, President and CEO of Frontier Airlines, were able to see how their decisions directly affect employees, uncover problems that exist within their organization, discover their high-performing employees, and gauge the Engagement level of their staff.

The show also illustrates the importance of senior management being visible and available to all employees. In fact, the leaders of HR Solutions' Best-in-Class^® clients are more than willing to get their hands dirty and work with their line-level employees to find out what really is going on in their organizations. Unfortunately, not every executive is able to go undercover due to the size or transparency of their organization. A similar way to assess employee morale and Engagement is to survey employees about their perception of the workplace and ask for anonymous feedback to make the organization a better place to work.

For decades, large and small organizations have essentially been going undercover by conducting annual Employee Engagement Surveys of their employees. Such surveys are advantageous for multiple reasons, including aligning employees with the company strategy and mission, discovering and implementing cost-saving opportunities, determining "Quick Wins" to improve Engagement, and identifying ways to retain top performers. These surveys are vital to the future of an organization and its employees; however, even more vital is what managers do with the results of the survey.

Employee Engagement levels will not increase if organizations fail to properly institute action plans designed to fix areas in need of improvement. Similar to undercover bosses' experiences working among their line-level employees, management must also act on the information learned from the survey to correct any shortcomings found within the organization. Inaction can be detrimental to the future of the organization and its employees.

Undercover Boss reinforces a people-focused culture, where executives experience their organization's operations firsthand and gather feedback from employees. Organizations that do not regularly quantify their employees' perceptions, feelings, and concerns are missing an opportunity to capture valuable information critical to the success of the organization. Whether an organization wants to send an executive undercover or simply ask its employees to complete an Employee Engagement Survey, the information gleaned from either undertaking can be used to enhance Engagement, retain top talent, and increase the amount of discretionary effort that employees are willing to exert for their employers. Simply put, if you go undercover for your employees, they will go above and beyond for you.