Keeping employees engaged and happy is a concern for every business. With high turnover rates and declining employee productivity an ongoing issue, companies large and small find it difficult to retain their staff.
One way savvy business owners manage the issue is with employee engagement software. This helpful tool allows you to measure employee satisfaction and give employees a voice through a dedicated platform. The end result? Boosted productivity and improved retention rates.
But if you’re unfamiliar with this software, you might not know where to start. I’ve reviewed the many options on the market today and whittled them down to the five best. I’ve also included strategies for determining which features are most important for your needs.
Read on to discover the best employee engagement software for your business.
The Top 5 Best Employee Engagement Software
- 15Five — The Best for Quick Check-Ins
- Culture Amp — The Best for Managers
- Kudos — The Best for Employee Recognition
- Trakstar — The Best for Customization
- Fortay — The Best for Analytics
Those are our top picks, so let’s get started.
#1 – 15Five — The Best for Quick Check-Ins
- Real-time feedback requests
- Integrates with Jira, Slack, and MS Teams
- Quick performance reviews
- Free iOS/Android mobile app
Sometimes long performance reviews aren’t the best choice for either managers or employees. After all, time is precious, and often quick check-ins are as good as getting the job done as anything else. 15Five is aware of this and offers short performance reviews that keep your employees happy and engaged.
The software encourages frequent and fast check-ins of fifteen minutes that keep things rolling without the fuss you find on some other platforms.
You’ll find a range of tools that allow your team to achieve more, from real-time feedback requests to hashtags and high fives that you can give out on the platform to team members. You can set up 1-on-1s that detail objectives for the review and show employees their hard work isn’t going unnoticed. Check-ins are as straightforward as you need, with the ability to schedule or reschedule an event in mere seconds.
It’s worth mentioning the wealth of impressive integrations here, with the option to connect to Jira, Slack, BambooHR, Namely, Microsoft Teams, SCIM, SSO, and Workday without jumping through multiple hoops to do so. On top of that is a free mobile app with the same features as the desktop version—a welcome bonus.
Pricing is also available and comes in four main tiers:
The main difference between these tiers is the available features. For example, you’ll have access to naming customization, Jira, and Salesforce integration on the Focus tier. That said, the first tier does give you enough to work with, and you’ll be able to upgrade the service as you go.
Even better, you can try out the software for free. A 14-day trial account is available with 15Five by simply filling in a quick form.
#2 – Culture Amp — The Best for Managers
- Ready-to-use surveys included
- Turnover prediction reports
- Powerful analytics
- 30+ customizable templates
Culture Amp lets managers conduct performance reviews and regularly keep up to date with how their employees feel.
The software offers a range of tools, from ready-to-use surveys to turnover prediction reports. The aim is to ensure that retention rates remain high, and ultimately, that employees remain happy to work for a company.
A survey template library featuring over 30 customizable templates is available, allowing you to understand engagement, onboarding, and inclusion. The best bit is that you’ll be able to customize the surveys based on your needs. Want to find out how employees view the current leadership of the company? You can, and managers can quickly access the information when they need it.
You’ll be able to highlight people’s expertise in your company with badges that make them feel valued, and there’s powerful analytics available that predict turnover rates. On the latter, the software will let managers know who is at risk of leaving, why, and how you can work on winning them back.
You can customize your reports how you wish, and the analytics feature intuitive heatmaps, trend lines, and more. It’s the complete solution.
Unfortunately, Culture Amp doesn’t list its prices, but you can reach out for a free demo today.
#3 – Kudos — The Best for Employee Recognition
- Badges and certificates included
- Customizable reward capabilities
- Automatic emails for special events
- Printable certificates available
It’s critical for employees to feel recognized and respected at the company they work for—no matter the industry. Kudos solves this by allowing you to reward the best workers through a series of robust tools.
The software encourages peer-to-peer connection and reinforces positive behaviors through awards, badges, and certificates—these act as types of gamification features that recognize top talent at every stage. For instance, each badge includes a printable certificate and publicity on the team’s wall for everyone to see, encouraging hard work and fostering a sense of ownership.
We’re fans of the customizable emails that Kudos sends out to your employees on special occasions, such as birthdays and work anniversaries. These events get posted on the team wall allowing everyone to join in and wish their colleagues well—it’s a great little feature.
You can also record personal videos for your employees that celebrate their hard work and encourage the team to do the same. Customizable rewards are part of this, and you can send your best workers everything from digital gift cards to loyalty program rewards.
Kudos doesn’t provide its prices publicly, but you can get in touch to request a quote. A free demo is also available.
#4 – Trakstar — The Best for Customization
- Personalized performance reviews
- Automated email reminders
- Simple and custom reports
- Flexible workflows
Great employee engagement software often features customization across its features, but Trakstar is the top choice for custom engagement and rewards. It lets you do what’s best for you and your team without being complicated.
Look at the performance reviews you can conduct through the platform, and you’ll find a world of customization awaits.
Every business will have different internal goals it wants to reach, and you can make these an integral part of the experience. You can add in goals and competencies related to a team member’s specific role and let them know when they achieved something directly on the platform.
You’ll be able to see outstanding review action items and send out handy automated email reminders to raters so that every employee gets the detailed evaluation and recognition they deserve. Custom reports allow you to make decisions based on your employees’ accomplishments, and you’ll be able to rate how well they’re doing quickly and easily.
You can tailor flexible workflows to fit your organization, giving you choices on how you want to review and reward performance.
Trakstar doesn’t list its prices, but you can sign up for a free live demo to see everything the software has to offer.
#5 – Fortay — The Best for Analytics
- Detailed and attractive analytics
- Fast real-time polls
- Custom and simple questionnaires
- Integrates with Slack
A good set of data can be the difference between success and failure, so employee engagement software that offers detailed insights is a win for your company. Fortay provides attractive data in almost everything it does and encourages managers and employees to up their game.
For instance, with the software, you can hire employees based on their core values and measure this over time. You’ll be able to see what employees think about their daily work activities, the organizational structure they prefer, and what values they want to see be a crucial part of your company.
Fortay displays the results to these questions with big and bold scores that let you know how compatible employees are with your company culture. A 96% match on values will be a good fit for your company, but the best thing is, you can see how this changes and adapt your strategy to keep your workers happy. Perhaps your employees want to see more recognition; if so, you’ll be able to get direct answers to this.
The software showcases how passionate employees are and lets them detail how valued they feel. These results are then displayed through the dashboard, boosting productivity and enabling you to keep your best workers satisfied and committed to the company.
Other notable features of the software include Slack integration for central communications, custom questionnaires, and real-time polls.
Fortay comes in three distinct tiers:
None of the tiers offer prices, and you’ll have to request a quote for details. The main difference is the number of users, ranging from the first tier for small businesses to the enterprise-grade level for much larger ones.
A free demo of the software is also available, and you can sign up for it here.
How To Find the Best Employee Engagement Software
Deciding on the best employee engagement software isn’t always the easiest of processes. With such a variety of tools available, it can be hard to pick the right one for you.
The good news is the core features in most employee engagement software are broadly similar. Where they differ is in the tools and some of the engagement features they offer.
For instance, some software will intensely focus on the employee recognition side of things, while others will be more about feedback and how you can receive that. What this comes down to, in the end, will largely depend on your company’s area of focus.
To make the process easier, we’ve detailed some of the critical areas to think about below.
Training Tools
Not all employee engagement software offers a comprehensive set of training tools, but we think it’s an important part of the package.
For larger organizations, certainly, knowledge retention is vital, so strong employee training tools are a must to keep things on track.
Great employee training tools will provide easily digestible information, segmented learning content, and gamification features to encourage participation.
Smaller businesses may need these tools less, but we still think they’re necessary for most companies.
Employee Recognition
One of the central elements of employee engagement software is the tools they offer for employee recognition.
Recognizing hard work and rewarding employees is a smart way to keep them happy and motivated. As you will have seen from our list, there are some compelling options here, from achievements to badges and video recognition itself.
How much you need these tools depends on personal preference, but smaller companies benefit from them the most.
Scalability
If your company has plans for the future, then the scalability of employee engagement software is an essential consideration.
When choosing a tool, it’s a good idea to check how easily the software would scale with your business plans and the extra costs involved to do so.
The ability to support secondary considerations, such as integrations and an increased number of users over time, are the areas you should look out for first and foremost.
Survey and Feedback Capability
It’s no good if you don’t know what your employees feel about their role in your company, and the best software will offer various feedback capabilities to find this out.
The ability to conduct surveys and collect feedback automatically is a real bonus and allows you to set goals, objectives and monitor the mood of your team over time.
We think most good software should have some form of feedback functionality, which will benefit companies of all shapes and sizes.
Summary
Employee engagement tools are more important than ever before. Today, if your employees aren’t happy, they won’t stick around, so retaining them and recognizing their work is essential.
Managers that need to keep up to date with their employees should opt for Culture Amp, while for a core focus on employee recognition, Kudos is a great choice.
If you favor customization, Trakstar won’t let you down with its flexibility, and 15Five is all about speedy check-ins that get the job done.
For data and analytics, go for Fortay who displays ongoing compatibility scores and allows you to keep team morale high.
Whatever you choose, be sure to take your time and factor in the tools and features available that will scale with your business, from training tools to surveys and employee recognition.
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