Finding outstanding teachers and staff is one of the most important tasks to master when running a reputable school. Keeping those valuable teachers is another skill set that must be refined. When it comes to retaining top talent in your private school, it’s best to solicit feedback from your staff and teachers regularly and implement their recommendations.
In the final analysis, keeping the lines of communication open between teachers, staff, and administrators improves the overall workplace.
Your School as an Employer
Understanding how your school stacks up compared to other schools in the area—including cyber school options—will enable you to frame your messaging strategy for your school’s marketing efforts. It will also help you retain top teachers and experienced staff members in a time when the teaching profession is not fully appreciated in our American society.
Implementing a staff survey program is an excellent way to measure job satisfaction among teachers and staff. Use these key findings and feedback to evaluate your school culture.
Net Promoter Score (NPS®)
The Net Promoter Score (NPS®) is a one-question survey used in customer experience programs. NPS measures the loyalty of customers to a company.
But the NPS survey can be a valuable tool in your school to assess the overall satisfaction of your faculty and staff. Plus, asking for feedback from your teachers and staff confirms that they belong and have a say in how they work.
Asking for faculty and staff input can also be used as a recruitment and retention strategy. There are many ways to entice prospective employees to work for your school, such as incentives, and benefits. One big way to improve an employee’s outlook on their job is to give them a sense of belonging; confirming the ways their unique skills fill your school’s needs. This can reap big rewards—one study found that when employees feel a sense of belonging at work, it can decrease sick days by 75 percent.
Combine your priorities with the preferences of your key constituents and use that tool repeatedly. The NPS survey enables you to remain aware of what your teachers and staff think about your school as an employer—this knowledge will help you make improvements and survive hardships.
Here are four reasons why you should use the NPS survey to evaluate teacher and staff satisfaction.
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Improve Teacher Retention
The COVID-19 pandemic pressed teachers and staff at schools alike to retire earlier than anticipated. That, paired with a teacher shortage, means your school must invest time and resources into keeping excellent teachers in the classroom. An NPS survey helps your team predict when teachers will retire or quit, allowing for better planning and prioritizing teacher needs to ensure your students are supported.
Increase Student Satisfaction
A happy classroom is easy to spot from a mile away, but not as easy to create. This is another area in which teachers’ happiness plays a critical role in the success of your school and its students. A happy teacher can create a happy classroom when their needs are met in their job, including all the regular employee benefits (such as medical insurance), plus a sense of belonging and accomplishment. The NPS score can consistently indicate the overall well-being of your teacher and staff population as you monitor their year-over-year increase (or decrease) in satisfaction.
Uncover Problems Early
A suggestion box in the faculty lounge is a great idea in theory, but there’s no aggregating mechanism that can help quantify the data and interpret insights. Implementing an NPS survey allows your team to gather feedback from all teachers and staff and segment data by audience, seniority, and other factors to help identify specific issues or needs.
Quantify Feedback
After hearing a sensational piece of feedback from one or more teachers, you might jump on the “Must-Fix-It-Now Express” at full speed. When using an NPS survey, you can assign weights to certain audience members’ ratings to ensure you’re not misappropriating resources to issues that aren’t widespread. Initial NPS findings will be overwhelming at first, but with regular use and feedback lines opened wide, you’ll find it easier to apply changes appropriately and with the correct amount of urgency and speed.
Creating a work culture at a busy, high-performing private school can be difficult to manage. Investing in an ISM membership is one way to expand your team’s skills without adding more responsibility to your plate. Access hundreds of training recordings and other online resources through the ISM membership level that suits your school’s budget.
