Giving Remote Employees a Voice—and Making Sure Leadership Is Listening with Empowered Education
About
Empowered Education is a skills-based education platform that provides certification training for health coaches, life coaches, and nutrition counselors. Founded in 2015, the 100%-remote company employs a global virtual workforce of about 250 employees across 31 states and 15 countries.
Action
By implementing 15Five, Empowered Education was able to gather employees’ feedback and make sure that managers were listening.
Results
NPS score of 31. Average weekly pulse score of 4.1. 2,100+ High Fives given in one month. Nearly 300% increase in reviewing feedback.
A culture of personal development
As an organization that’s dedicated to empowering people to be their best selves,
Empowered Education takes employee engagement seriously—it’s part of the culture. Vice President of Human Resources Libby Nicholson observes that the company tends to attract people who are interested in personal development and helping others self-actualize.
Because Empowered Education is 100% remote, staying engaged with employees is especially important. “Culture is really important to our success, especially in a virtual service platform,” says Libby. But engaging a remote workforce is no small feat, and Empowered Education is faced with the challenge of keeping up with hundreds of employees across 31 states and 15 countries.
Listening to feedback
In order to uphold a culture focused on selfactualization, Empowered Education needs a way to listen to its employees. 15Five enables Empowered Education’s leadership to gather employees’ feedback and respond as needed. “This is so important in a 100%-virtual team,” notes Libby.
The company generally maintains a weekly pulse score of 4.1 or higher. Whenever anyone scores a one or two, Libby makes sure to check in. Not only does 15Five data alert Libby and her team to individual issues, it also offers insights that guide strategic decisions. “It’s always such a good idea to back up decisions that we’re making with data, and 15Five gives us the ability to do that,” she says.
15Five also enables employees to recognize one another with the popular High Fives feature. The company incorporates High Fives into its monthly MVP celebration, with a presentation that features a picture of the winner with a quote from their 15Five feedback.
Collaborative partnership
In 15Five, Libby and her colleagues found the tools they needed and a team that’s eager to collaborate with them to build custom solutions. “There are so many companies [that say], ‘Nope, that’s just our software. It doesn’t do that, we’re sorry,’” says Libby.” But in 15Five, she found a true partner. “The willingness to explore whatever different ideas we have … is really appreciated,” she says.
Integrations with other tools
As a Gallup-Certified Strengths Coach, Libby appreciates that 15Five can be integrated with other tools and systems, including Gallup’s Strengths. She also uses 15Five in conjunction with Bamboo HR: To gather anonymous feedback, Libby uses a Bamboo HR survey tool. “Then, based on the answers, we can use the question feature in 15Five to drill down into specific areas of concern,” she explains.
Finding the right solution
Empowered Education started using 15Five when the company was founded in 2015. The HR team took a brief break from the product to explore other platforms, but ultimately came back to 15Five. “We just didn’t find something else that worked quite as well,” says Libby.
When she noticed that some managers weren’t taking the time to review their weekly 15Five Check-ins, Libby partnered with 15Five staff to create a weekly report that included, among other metrics, the number of managers who reviewed their Check-ins. As a result, the review rate has increased by nearly 300%.
And when her team wanted the ability to enter an employee into 15Five before their start date, they met with the 15Five development team. “They worked with us and then we were able to incorporate that,” says Libby. “They’ve been really responsive.”
See how 15Five can help you improve employee engagement
