Assessment FAQ's
Here you will find some common questions regarding the 6 Pillars assessment and Workplace Temperature Check. Our Clinical Team has provided the answers to these. If you have any further questions, reach out to your Customer Success Manager directly.
Workplace Temperature Check: An agreement score of 80-90% is indicative of strong wellbeing on any given item, while 90%+ agreement is seen as an excellent score.
There are some items, specifically ‘appropriate action would be taken in response to incidents of bullying, harassment or discrimination’ where a high rate of agreement is an important indicator of a safe culture.
6 Pillars: This is a measure of individual wellbeing. The higher the percentage of respondents engaging in (6 Pillar) wellbeing actions often and everyday show greater wellbeing. Overall, ‘good’ looks like respondents indicating that in at least two of the three general wellbeing items (managed stress well, got over setbacks quickly, and been cheerful) they are at the level of often or every day.We do not analyse our data based on industry to protect the privacy of our clients. However, patterns emerging from existing data shows that individual wellbeing items in the 'Move' and 'Do' pillars generally score higher than the other pillars. 'Celebrate' and 'Enjoy' pillars tend to be the low scorers indicating that focusing on rituals around these pillars is important.
With the Workplace Temperature Check, items related to communication, change management, conflict, leaders modelling wellbeing and having time to focus on wellbeing during the workday tend to be the most frequent low scorers. This indicates that most workplaces will benefit from focusing on creating psychologically safe environments and prioritising wellbeing actions.
The items on the surveys are informed by robust research in organisational psychology and wellbeing habit building, and have been validated to ensure reliability and accuracy. While we don’t analyse our data by industry, we are seeing similar patterns across the board. Effective communication, change management and conflict resolution are all significant predictors of workplace wellbeing.In terms of the Workplace Temperature Check, there is a significant variation in the ‘strongest’ items. However, baseline trends suggest that the items indicative of work life balance (‘it is easy to arrange time off to take care of personal or family matters’), autonomy (‘I have control over when and how their work gets done, as long as it’s done well and on time’) and physical work environment (‘my physical work environment is comfortable’) commonly appear in the strengths.
Similarly, there is significant variation in the opportunities for improvement (low performing items) at baseline, but we most commonly see:
-
Effective training and support are available for those supporting others with mental health issues.
-
Communication is clear and effective at all levels.
-
Employees are given time for wellbeing in the workday.
-
Leaders model wellbeing by doing things for their wellbeing during the workday.
-
Taking opportunities for fun is encouraged.
-
Change is managed well.
-
Conflict is handled well.
In terms of the 6 Pillars, at baseline there are similar trends across organisations. These align with large population studies we have conducted in New Zealand and Australia. Respondents reported that they engage in ‘move’ and ‘do’ pillar activities more often than actions related to other pillars. Doing things to engage their brains and engaging in some physical activity tend to be consistent high scorers at baseline. Items in ‘celebrate’ and ‘enjoy’ pillars tend to have lower scores.
-
Across various workplaces, the results show that Groov is having a positive impact.
When compared to baseline, results have shown significant improvements in:
-
psychological safety
-
modeling of wellbeing by leaders
-
employees being given time for wellbeing in the workday
-
mental wellbeing being discussed openly without stigma, and
-
the perception that peoples’ workplace cares about their wellbeing.
Shifting the perception that "my work place cares about my wellbeing" is particularly important given our recent general population study associating the perception that my workplace does not support my wellbeing with thoughts of resignation "most days".
We have seen a significant improvement in Workplace Temperature Check results following Groov’s modules ‘LEAD, SHOW and CARE’.
Furthermore, there have been significant increases (often above 20%) in individual wellbeing under the 6 pillars which underpin the approach by Groov. 6 Pillars results show improvement across timepoints, especially amongst those items that are lower scoring at baseline (and thus have the greatest room for improvement). This generally includes items relating to self-kindness, celebrating achievements and general wellbeing.
-
Total scores are calculated by combining the percentages by responses. Opportunities for improvement are based on the 3–5 lowest scoring items within the sample. In the case of the 6 Pillars Survey, these are the items that score the lowest for 'often' and 'everyday' combined. In the case of the Workplace Temperature Check, these are the items that score the lowest for 'agree' and 'strongly agree' combined
Total scores are calculated by combining the percentages by responses. Notable strengths are based on the 3–5 highest scoring items within the sample. In the case of the 6 Pillars Survey, these are the items that score the highest for 'often' and 'everyday' combined. In the case of the Workplace Temperature Check, these are the items that score the highest for 'agree' and 'strongly agree' combined.
Including a neutral option may increase the accuracy of survey data because respondents who feel they do not have enough information to answer conclusively may prefer to select the neutral response option, instead of randomly selecting a response option or skipping the question.
In the Workplace Temperature Check, answer ‘3’ on the scale of 1-5 refers to a neutral response. Respondents choose neutral responses on a sliding scale due to three main reasons: 1) they have not read the item properly/don’t want to spend time in doing so and go with the middle answer; 2) they are not sure whether to agree or disagree (they don’t know the answer due to lack of information); or 3) they don’t feel safe in expressing their disagreement.
A large percentage of answer ‘3’ can be indicative of an underlying workplace culture challenge where employees may not be empowered to express their opinions or don’t have access to the right information to create an opinion. It could also mean that things are not ‘bad enough’ to disagree but not ‘good enough’ to agree - meaning there is room for improvement. The objective of components of the Embed Programme such as the ‘LEAD, SHOW and CARE’ modules and the Ritual Builder website is to shift the workplace culture in the positive direction.
These are foundational modules in the programme. These will help your people look after their wellbeing and show everyone how to lead wellbeing so that the entire organisation flourishes. They will also help you and your people be equipped in a meaningful way to recognise, help and support those in distress.
Psychological Safety training addresses emotional wellbeing at work, but it differs from standard emotional health resources like employee assistance programmes (EAP). While the latter option is excellent for addressing an individual employee’s emotional health needs, psychological safety training looks at things from a systemic point of view:
-
How is our work culture hindering people from being their best?
And from a leadership point of view:
-
What are the leaders of the organisation doing to create a safe, inclusive and positive culture?
Evidence shows that the benefits of creating a psychologically safe workplace include; increased productivity and profitability, greater creativity and innovation, and improved team cohesion and adaptability to change.
-
For data to be valid, a minimum response rate is required. This minimum response percentage varies by the size of the organisation. The smaller the organisation, the higher the percentage of responses needed in order to obtain representative results.
We recommend a minimum according to the number of surveys sent:
-
<16 - 40%
-
17 to 100 - 30%
-
>100 - 20%
While these are the minimum recommended percentages, greater the response rate is, the more accurate your results.
-
If the response rate is low, there may be a lack of representation of people in your workplace. This will not give us an accurate picture of what is really going on. For a wellbeing action or intervention to yield desired results, capturing the voice of as many people as possible is important. It is very unlikely you will get a 100% response rate. However, you can try the below suggested methods to increase response rates as much as possible.
1. Communicate the importance of these surveys - what is done with the information and how it shapes the focus for your workplace. Utilise existing communications platforms (virtual and physical) - including meetings. This highlights the importance of sharing findings with your people - to close the loop and reassure that they are heard.
2. Identifying and removing barriers to responses. For example, if it is that people are too busy:
-
Block 5 minutes in calendars
-
Reserve 5 minutes at the start of a team meeting
-
Make a public computer available for non-wired staff
-
Extend lunch breaks by 5 minutes.
3. Make sure that your people know that they'll receive their own personalised 6 Pillars report after completing the assessment. The report gives them an understanding of where they are with their mental wellbeing, and is full of simple, easy ways to improve their wellbeing.
-
While there is a minimum recommended number of responses needed to draw valid conclusions, in some cases response rates can be low for a myriad of reasons. When interpreting results, taking the number of respondents into consideration is necessary. If less than the recommended percentage answered, this may not indicate the full and accurate picture. However, any number of participants can help us understand what the strengths are and where efforts to improve should be focused.