There are many strategies you can implement to increase employee engagement, and there are also numerous employee engagement tools you can use. The key is to find the tool that aligns with your unique strategy.
Engaged employees are more productive, motivated, and driven. On the other hand, disengaged employees can cost your company tens of thousands, if not millions, of dollars every year. In fact, Gallup’s 2023 State of the Global Workforce report states that disengaged employees cost global companies $8.8 trillion dollars in lost productivity.
As more and more employees value their well-being and satisfaction at work and are ready to quit or “quiet quit” when these conditions aren’t met, companies realize that employee engagement is critical to their growth and success.
There are many strategies you can implement to increase employee engagement, and there are also numerous employee engagement tools you can use. The key is to find the tool that aligns with your unique strategy.
In this article, we’ve compiled a list of the top 9 best employee engagement software.
These tools are designed to improve various areas of employee engagement and create a better work environment.
If you’re reading this article, it’s because you’re on the lookout for the best employee engagement software. But what is it, really?
Employee engagement software isn’t a one-size-fits-all tool you can use to boost employee engagement in your company. This software comes in various forms and addresses different aspects of employee engagement.
For instance, one employee engagement tool can focus on enhancing communication and collaboration within teams, while another may concentrate on recognizing and rewarding employee achievements.
There are numerous areas to consider, and no single tool can magically address all of them. These areas include:
The key is to opt for the tool that best aligns with your unique strategy.
If you find yourself wondering which tools can help you improve employee engagement, refer to our list of the most impactful employee engagement software.
Wondering what’s the best employee engagement software for your company? In this section, we share the 9 most impactful tools to help with different aspects of your employee engagement strategy.
Short on time? Scroll to the end to find a concise comparative table.
One way to boost employee engagement is by giving your employees an opportunity to voice their opinions and share their ideas. However, using idea collection as part of your employee engagement strategy is more than simply encouraging employees to share their feedback or ideas.
You also need an effective way to collect their ideas and make sure that each idea is taken into consideration. The best way to do that is with an idea management platform like Ideanote.
Ideanote is an innovation-led solution for collecting and managing ideas to solve company problems and challenges. With Ideanote, you can take your employee ideas through every step of the idea management workflow, guiding them from collection through evaluation and selection towards implementation.
Ideanote is more than an idea collection tool. It’s an innovation-led platform that helps you encourage your employees to contribute their ideas anytime, creating a company culture of continuous growth and innovation.
Collecting employee ideas is a great way to make them more engaged. But simply having an idea management tool alone won't get you the results you're looking for. What truly matters is turning idea collection and management into an ongoing practice at your company and creating a culture of continuous innovation.
G2: 4.7/5
Capterra: 4.9/5
Open communication builds trust and creates a sense of inclusion, making your employees feel like they are part of the company and, thus, boosting their engagement.
Hub is an intranet solution that serves as a centralized hub where employees can access company news, updates, and internal resources. It also allows them to collaborate and share ideas with their colleagues, fostering stronger connections and creating a sense of belonging to a tight-knit community.
Overall, Hub is an excellent tool for improving internal communication. It can also help you improve collaboration with discussion boards and project management features and measure employee morale via integrated surveys. Plus, it offers employee recognition features like badges and leaderboards.
G2: 4.2/5
Capterra: 4.5/5
Employee surveys are one of the most effective tools to measure current levels of engagement within your company and determine which areas must be improved to increase employee engagement.
You can use a digital survey platform like SurveySparrow to conduct employee surveys.
SurveySparrow is an all-in-one omnichannel experience management platform. Simply put, it allows you to create professional employee surveys and distribute them across multiple channels.
Then, it lets you analyze the responses to gain actionable insights into what’s working and what isn’t.
G2: 4.4/5
Capterra: 4.4/5
Making employees feel heard, valued, and rewarded for their hard work is essential to every employee engagement strategy. To implement this strategy effectively, you can use an employee recognition platform, such as Kudos.
Kudos is an employee recognition and rewards tool that can help foster a culture of appreciation within your company. It enables employees to give peer-to-peer recognition through personalized messages, digital badges, and points, which can be redeemed for rewards.
With Kudos, users can exchange their points for rewards like merchandise, events, hotel stays, charity donations, and gift cards. You can also create custom rewards, like a lunch with the CEO or an extra day off.
What's more, Kudos offers people analytics for tracking the impact of recognition efforts and often features social recognition feeds. It can be integrated with other tools like Microsoft Teams and Slack.
G2: 4.8/5
Capterra: 4.8/5
Ineffective management can quickly drive employee engagement to the ground. In fact, uninspiring and uncaring managers are one of the top reasons why employees quit their jobs.
A software like 15Five is designed to help you avoid just that by allowing your employees to provide regular feedback to their managers and leaders in just 15 minutes a day (hence, the name 15Five).
15Five helps bring employees and their managers on the same page with regular check-ins and performance reviews and make a real change with goal tracking and skill training.
G2: 4.6/5
Capterra: 4.8/5
You can’t improve employee engagement unless you continuously monitor it. PerformYard is an HR performance software designed to help you track employee performance through goal setting, feedback collection, and performance reviews.
PerformYard allows you to evaluate your employee’s experience performance in detail and from multiple angles with specialized reviews, such as annual reviews, competency-based reviews, and project-based reviews, so you can get a 360-degree picture of their experience.
G2: 4.8/5
Capterra: 4.8/5
What’s better to make employees feel more connected to the company if not an internal company social media feed? You can set one up with Workvivo - a modern internet platform designed to replace traditional intranet employees barely use.
With Workvivo, you can create a digital hub where employees can share updates and stories, comment on each other's achievements, and stay informed about company news and events.
With features like a social feed, recognition tools, and real-time communication channels, your employees can feel more connected to the company and their coworkers.
G2: 4.8/5
Capterra: 4.7/5
Employees who are given the chance to develop and grow in their roles tend to be more engaged. That’s why providing your employees with learning experiences can be one of the most effective employee engagement strategies.
Leapsome is a comprehensive employee engagement platform that enhances employee engagement through a combination of performance reviews, employee feedback surveys, and personalized learning experiences.
Among the many features of Leapsome, the most noteworthy is its personalized learning tool. This feature is designed to help new hires learn the necessary skills to perform well in their roles and to help existing employees improve their skills.
Leapsome allows companies to create dynamic learning experiences for their employees with features like learning paths, learning libraries, and free courses.
G2: 4.8/5
Capterra: 4.7/5
Lattice is an innovative goal-setting software that helps you align your teams around objectives, encourage cross-functional collaboration, and accelerate business growth.
More specifically, it helps you create objectives and key results (OKRs) to bring your team on the same page. Then, you can easily track these goals and measure progress by keeping everyone in the loop with visual dashboards.
Aside from goal-setting, Lattice offers performance reviews, productivity and compensation tools, employee feedback surveys, and HRIS.
G2: 4.7/5
Capterra: 4.4/5
There are too many great employee engagement tools to cover in this list. While we chose the top 9 according to our criteria, there are other tools that may be worth your attention.
So, here are some honorable mentions of 4 extra tools that are also great but didn’t make it to our top 9 list:
The secret to choosing the most effective employee engagement tools is ensuring they support your overall strategy.
So, before you set out on a journey to find the right tools, you must have a detailed employee engagement strategy with clearly defined goals. Without it, you won’t be able to choose the tools that can help you achieve your desired results.
Then, set a reasonable budget and keep in mind that many employee engagement platforms follow a per-user pricing model, where the cost rises with the number of users. To avoid surprises, estimate your potential user count as your company grows.
Lastly, pay attention to the ease of use of every tool you select. If it’s too complex, your employees will likely feel reluctant to go through the learning curve.
The easier and more enjoyable it is to use, the higher the chances your employees will willingly implement it in their daily routines.
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