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So, the staff survey results have come out at work. It would be fair to describe them as “damning”. To the objective observer having only 7% of respondents agree with the statement “where I work morale is high” would suggest that there is an issue. As would only 4% of people agreeing that “senior management are in touch with the views and concerns of staff”.

My Head of Unit held an emergency meeting with some of the senior managers and the conclusion was that last year was a difficult one but it was “time to look to the future”. They also decided that the “senior management” in the survey did not refer to those within the unit, but instead were the senior managers above the senior managers in the unit– if that makes any sense? Well it certainly didn’t to me.

Anyway, there was no sign of the comments that people had given on the survey, but then one of my colleagues was searching for something on the intranet and stumbled across the comments. Admittedly they were very well hidden and my suspicion is that we are not meant to have access to them, as there were absolutely no links to it and no-one else appeared to have been aware of their existence – but if it’s on the intranet, it is obviously for general consumption. Well, that’s what my colleagues decided.

Whilst the staff survey may have been damning, the comments were very damning or what might alternatively be described as career ending. Responses to the question “what one thing could be done to improve the organisation?” being “get rid of our Head of Unit” or more general comments like “I have never worked in such an oppressive atmosphere” again indicate that all may not be well.

The problem is that someone seems to have made an error, which might indicate that someone was just being over-efficient when they put the comments on the intranet. The problem is that you can identify who some of the respondents are to this anonymous and confidential survey and the blood certainly drained out of a few people’s faces when they saw that their comments has been reproduced verbatim.

I have sent an e-mail out to my team to ask them to treat the comments with due care, particularly given the personal nature of some of what has been said. They’re a decent bunch so will do the right thing, but if it were me I would want to check the comments to see if mine had been published. But the thing is that despite the weight of evidence, I think the whole situation will still be a whitewash. Only now we will have to face our Head of Unit’s wrath because she is likely to turn it into a bit of a witch-hunt to find out who made the comments. Well, I guess if you express your views it is good to know that they are acted upon. There are interesting times ahead.