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The Importance of Organizational Surveys

Posted On July 30, 2020

Organizational evaluation—assessing your activities, systems, and structures—is an essential first step in inclusion, equity, and diversity work.

BY EMILY NEWMAN, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF CAMBER OUTDOORS

Organizational evaluation—the act of collecting baseline information and measuring progress—is crucial to building inclusive, equitable, and diverse workplaces. Using research-based questionnaires, organizational evaluation allows companies to assess their activities, systems, and structures. If a workplace wants to make progress towards its goals, these surveys are a critical first step.

Camber Outdoors is proud to partner with the field-leading Claremont Evaluation Center to provide two new surveys for our partners: an Industry Workplace Survey and an Employee Survey. The aggregated data from these surveys will support tailored plans for our partners, as well as learnings for the active-outdoors industry as a whole. In participating, you’ll help lay the groundwork for inclusive recruitment, retention, and organizational plans.

The end goal? Workplaces that work for everyone.

“The deep work of gathering and analyzing data through multiple lenses is a key driver of systemic change,” says Jennifer Villalobos, Adjunct Professor and Research & Evaluation Consultant at Claremont Graduate University. “The benefit of workplace evaluation is that it enables companies to derive data-driven insights that can be used to continually optimize inclusion, equity, and diversity work  — for stronger financial performance, enhanced productivity, and greater engagement of all stakeholders, including employees, customers, partners, communities, and shareholders.”

Alongside the Claremont team, we will analyze and interpret the data with an inclusive lens. Moreover, Camber will meet with each of our partners one on one to discuss each company’s survey results. In these meetings, we will review the Industry Workplace Survey, support an actionable plan, and outline opportunities for the next steps. Of course, every plan will be tailored to each company’s individual goals.

Commit to the rigorous measurement of DEI goals by:

– Measuring company standing and progress on DEI scaled with peer companies

– Track employee satisfaction with workplace DEI programs

Note that Camber Outdoors will soon be conducting a Workplace Survey and an Employee Survey to address the two points above. If you participate in the survey as a Corporate Partner member (50% employee activation required), your company will receive the following resources to guide you in your DEI programming:

  1. Industry-Wide Report gauging your company’s activities in an industry context
  2. Company-Specific Report on your employees’ impressions of your current DEI programs

To access these valuable resources, visit www.camberoutdoors.org/join. We offer a variety of partnership opportunities for corporations, small businesses, and nonprofits.

Brian Shaughnessy

About Brian Shaughnessy