UCHealth Drives 23% Jump in Survey Participation Through Unified Strategy

The Opportunity

UCHealth faced a critical challenge in its employee listening strategy: survey fatigue. Their staff, already focused on delivering exceptional patient care, were burdened with multiple disconnected surveys throughout the year — from quality and safety assessments to nursing satisfaction and employee engagement surveys. This fragmentation not only diverted time from patient care but also hindered data analysis.

The challenge was compounded by diminished employee confidence in the survey process, stemming from pandemic-related pauses and inconsistent action planning. With a participation rate of just 44% in October 2022, they needed to rebuild trust in their listening strategy while making it more efficient and effective.

The Solution

UCHealth overhauled its listening approach, consolidating all key employee surveys into a single, unified platform under its "Employee Voice" brand. This consolidation went beyond a simple combination of surveys — it represented a shift in how they gathered and acted on employee feedback.

To rebuild trust, they implemented several changes. They strengthened confidentiality by restricting leader access to results during survey periods. They established a clear bi-annual cadence with a census survey every February and a pulse survey each September. Most importantly, they launched a "You Spoke. We Listened." campaign to highlight actions taken based on feedback.

The organization also revamped its approach to action planning. Using Perceptyx's 1-2-3 methodology, leaders were required to identify one focus area, develop two specific actions, and schedule three follow-up check-ins. They created a dedicated intranet landing page displaying facility-level action plans and progress updates, ensuring transparency throughout the process.

The Impact

UCHealth’s participation rate surged from 44% to 67% during their first unified survey — a 23% increase that demonstrated renewed employee trust in the process. Perhaps more importantly, confidence that feedback would drive real change increased from 47.5% to 60.5% favorable in just eight months.

The October 2024 pulse survey revealed significant improvements in favorability across multiple dimensions:

• Manager feedback effectiveness increased by 4.8% to 76%
• Cross-department cooperation improved by 5.6% to 63.5%
• Recognition of accomplishments rose by 4.4% to 70.3%
• Perception of well-being support increased by 2.5% to 63.3%

Even diversity perception showed positive movement, increasing by 1.8% to 75.6% favorable.

By streamlining its survey process while increasing accountability and transparency with data-driven insights, UCHealth has built a more engaging workplace culture that supports its primary value: patients first.