At last Friday’s University-wide Town Hall meeting, some results of the ND Voice survey (distributed in February) were presented. Your feedback about how well the University and Mendoza are performing in providing a workplace that contributes to your wellbeing is very important to me. I appreciate your candor and feedback about what is going well and where you think we can improve. We can’t get better without understanding where we have key areas of opportunity to do better.
Reviewing the results for Mendoza, here are a few items that stood out to me:
- Our participation rate was 80.9%, which is an excellent number and speaks to the importance you placed on providing your input. Our highest scores are around Engagement and Work Community, where we have higher numbers than the overall University.
- Respect and Fairness consistently earned a low score across the University, which is a concern and an opportunity to improve, and I commit to diving into the issue more deeply.
- We also have room to improve in the category of Recognition, which is another area of opportunity across campus.
- It would be good to better understand differences in scores between men and women, and explore how we can address these.
I am committed to working together with the associate deans, directors and managers across the College to both celebrate where we do well and to work on areas where we can improve. The timeline for the next steps is as follows:
May/June: Kara and I will be meeting individually with all directors and associate deans who received ND Voice reports specific to their departments to discuss the results, areas of strengths and opportunities, and next steps for action.
June 18: During our next Staff Town Hall, I will present Mendoza’s results in more detail.
Summer 2019: We will start executing action plans, involving all staff across the College.
Winter 2019: We will conduct pulse surveys across the College and schedule check-in meetings to measure our progress and determine additional follow-up.
Please know that you do not need to wait for the next ND Voice to raise questions or concerns, and I encourage you to talk to your manager, director, associate dean or myself. Thank you for your service to Mendoza!
In Notre Dame,
Martijn