Action Plan IMPACT: Human Resources team “gets a gauge” on employee engagement

“Imagine it’s five years from now and UPEI has the best culture possible. In one or two words, what does it look like?”

This was the question asked at the March 5, 2025, town hall when an overview of the UPEI Employment Engagement Survey results was presented to the campus community by Jessica Field, Manager, Employee Experience and Development. Several themes emerged from the employee responses about the ideal workplace culture: respectful, collaborative, transparent, and one in which they feel valued. The survey results and the words appearing in the word cloud created at the town hall have been guiding and inspiring the employee engagement team in Human Resources ever since!

Goal 3 in the UPEI Action Plan is to “Improve UPEI’s Campus Culture,” and Action 2 under that goal  is to “Foster an environment in which employees feel valued.” One of the first implementation activities taken in Year 1 to begin this work was to expand the Human Resources team, including hiring Jessica.

Once this was completed, the next step was to gather information through an employment engagement survey. Employee engagement is defined as "a strong emotional and intellectual connection that employees have for their job, co-workers, manager, senior leaders, and the organization, which inspires and motivates them to go above and beyond in their work."

The University engaged TalentMap, the preferred provider selected through an RFP process led by Interuniversity Services Inc., to assist UPEI establish baseline data and identify trends and benchmark them against industry standards.

TalentMap has extensive experience in measuring and managing employee feedback surveys, including engagement, culture, diversity, equity and inclusion, entry, exit, and more. Their employee engagement model builds on published peer-reviewed research as well as existing well-documented empirical models linking employee feedback to organizational performance. It has been shown that gathering this data will increase employee engagement, leading to better overall organizational performance and a more enjoyable workplace culture. 

While UPEI’s confidential survey, which was launched in November 2024, was part of a UPEI Action Plan goal, there were so many other important reasons to gauge employee engagement and gather feedback:

• to allow employees to voice their opinions,
• to assist UPEI in focusing efforts and resources, and
• to identify problems/opportunities sooner. 

Once the results were analyzed in early 2025 and presented to the UPEI community in March, HR’s employee engagement team got to work. They were armed with the data they needed to plan and develop initiatives to enhance employee engagement and recognize contributions made by employees to the University. We will share more about these initiatives in future editions of Action Plan IMPACT.

We will be telling the stories of important progress on the UPEI Action Plan on a regular basis, under the “Action Plan IMPACT” banner. Articles will share how the Action Plan implementation activities are being operationalized, becoming entrenched in our culture and living on long past the plan—making real IMPACT. To submit your own "Action Plan IMPACT" story, contact communications@upei.ca.