May 5, 2025
Ever felt like the feedback you get isn't that useful? TL;DR: It’s probably not the feedback - it’s the way you asked.
In other words...it's not them, it's you. Want better feedback? Just ask better questions. Sounds simple, but in reality this is much easier said than done.
Before we dive in, a little context.
Joyous makes it simple for leaders to quickly identify high-impact changes based on frontline feedback.
Our platform - and the questions we design - helps some of the world’s largest organisations uncover fast, actionable insight across areas like cost optimisation, service delivery, workflow efficiency, employee experience, accelerating change, and sales innovation.
Behind the scenes, we’ve developed a library of conversation templates and a structured, question formula. An approach based on millions of conversations and years of experimenting and refinement.
That approach is the foundation of this blog.
Why now?
Because last week we launched our AI Campaign Design Assistant. It doesn’t just craft upfront questions - it scripts full conversations, combining structured drafts with our existing dynamic real-time follow-ups.
It’s our best work, made accessible at scale.
And if you care about asking better questions - and getting better, more useful answers - I’d love to share some tips based on what we’ve learned.
Three good reasons not to ask for feedback:
If any of those are true, then don’t ask.
As the CEO of a feedback company, you might be surprised I’m saying this. But we give this advice to customers all the time.
Feedback is a valuable resource. Please don’t waste it. Everyone’s busy enough already.
Surveys might get you scale, but they are too long and too vague.
People talk about survey fatigue. I talk about survey trauma.
I get it though. You feel like you have to ask all those questions. Your KPIs depend on them. Management expects them. But even if it’s easier said than done, it’s still worth challenging.
We're all on a feedback journey - myself included.
To be transparent, our methodology does include an optional baseline survey to start, followed by short pulses to verify impact.
But the real goal? Getting to fast, targeted conversations.
So if not surveys, then what?
Joyous is primarily focused on the last one.
You've got between 60 seconds to 3 minutes before you start to lose people. Largely thanks to that device you're reading this on.
A Joyous campaign covers two topics, tackled over two weeks - each with a pre-designed rated statement and an open text question.
After someone replies to the open text question, an AI agent first checks if the response is detailed or vague. If it's vague, it asks a tailored follow-up - once only.
This means no need for more questions or complex branching upfront. People can simply speak their mind, and we follow their lead in real time.
Our data from millions of conversations confirms: Asking less (questions) actually gets you more (actionable insight).
Thanks to this approach the average Joyous conversation is wrapped up in less than 2 minutes. With enough depth to act on.
Poorly formed questions are the number one reason leaders get bad feedback. And you, dear leader, are probably not trained in the art (and science) of writing great ones.
Here’s what our new AI assistant builds into every campaign:
Don’t separate problem and solution. Ask a question that gets you both - it's just more efficient this way.
Example:
The second one gives you the barrier and the fix.
Keep it simple and short, aiming for Grade 6 or lower. Avoid jargon, acronyms, adverbs, and passive voice. This reduces the risk of confusion, especially for non-native readers.
Example:
The first is 19 words, Grade 15, and very hard to read. The second is 13 words, Grade 6, and clear.
Fun fact: this blog reads at Grade 5.
Compound questions confuse people and muddy results.
Example:
Otherwise, they might only answer one part - and you won’t know which, making it hard to analyse.
Don’t put people on the spot. Ask about the thing, not the person.
Examples:
A good campaign design flows like a real conversation.
The initial messages should be in natural language and each question should follow logically from the last. This makes the interaction for the person responding more comfortable.
Example:
Shameless plug? Maybe. But it’s worth it. And honestly, I'm just bloody proud of us.
Here's how it generates high-quality questions (and a full campaign draft) in seconds.:
We use either a GPT-4o or Gemini 2.0 Pro prompt (like ice-cream we let people pick their fave flavours).
We optimise the output with a process called RAG (retrieval augmented generation). In plain English: it only pulls from our proven campaigns, so it doesn’t go rogue or get weird.
This isn’t generic AI. It’s purpose-built. Using our structured approach, domain expertise, and conversation insights proven and refined over many years.
I hope the next question (pair) you ask your team unlocks truly useful feedback for you!
In a world of constant change and stretched teams, leaders struggle to meaningfully engage frontline teams in ways that drive real impact.
As a result, change takes longer, costs more and often fails altogether.
Rather than using AI to replace humans, Joyous uses AI to help leaders make sense of critical human thinking. We run one-on-one conversations across the frontline, surfacing actionable insight and delivering a prioritised action plan - fast.
And yes, we make it just as easy for you to share the plan and the outcomes back to those who gave feedback.
If you’re not already tapping into this - the real insight hiding in plain sight - ask yourself: can you afford not to?
Good design = more accurate and useful responses. Every question:
And yes, skipping a question is always an option. This keeps participants in control and increases survey completion rates.
The Joyous HR Engagement model is based upon an Open Source project that was released by Joyous in 2019, namely the EX Genome Project. This engagement model has continuously evolved and been regularly updated and revised since.
In 2025, the Joyous HR Engagement Model consists of a library of assets, including survey and campaign templates, all of which are available directly from the tool in the People & Culture category of the Campaign Templates Gallery.
These templates are highly customisable and configurable:
The Employee Experience Genome Project V1.0 was first released in 2019 after 18 months of research. Since then Joyous has incorporated the feedback and analysis of millions of responses in Joyous.
The purpose of the Employee Experience Genome project is to demystify the science of measuring employee experience and engagement - enabling a more transparent, productive workplace. And importantly: to make that science easy to understand and accessible for all.
The premise of the model is that Employee Experience is everything people encounter, observe or feel at work. Employee Engagement is the emotional commitment people have to their workplace.
The model breaks Employee Experience into three core categories that have the greatest impact on engagement: Culture & Environment, Fairness & Inclusion, and Wellbeing. These are complimented by a fourth category: Engagement.
Each category includes three topics. The first release included 25 question pairs offering two rated statements per topic, each with a related open-text question, often referred to as a conversation starter.
A few early adopters in the first two years saw great success with the conversational approach. The biggest success was a shift in the perception that 'nobody is listening' and 'nothing ever changes' as a result of feedback. For many, changes were personal, and therefore highly visible.
Leaders were responding directly to employee feedback. Ensuring a positive employee experience was no longer perceived as the sole responsibility of the HR team. Instead it became a shared responsibility across HR, leaders and the individual employee.
At the same time other adopters faced challenges. Not all teams or industries were ready for open dialogue between managers and employees. Our research discovered a strong correlation in drop off rates to manager engagement.
In all cases, repeated exposure to the same questions led to fatigue - similar to what occurs with traditional surveys - and participation gradually dropped off over time.
Participation rates dropped by 15% to 35% over a six to 12 month period until hitting a plateau.
Another challenge faced was skepticism from senior leaders that the scoring was accurate, due to the open nature of the feedback. Joyous later conducted an experiment which disproved this, however this skepticism remained.
In parallel, many customers started using Joyous for operational feedback. Their goal was to make people's jobs easier by reducing friction in their daily tasks. This not only improves employee experience but also has a positive impact on cost efficiency and productivity. In contrast to the employee experience use case, the operational use case found open and conversational feedback to be effective and universally positive.
Instead of conversations with managers, employees were engaging directly with Subject Matter Experts or Project Leaders right before or after they implemented significant changes in products, services, tools, processes or organisational structure.
Several customers correlated an increase in their employee engagement scores with the shift to using Joyous for operational feedback.
In 2021, Joyous released Employee Experience Genome Project V2.0.
The original question set was revised based on feedback from early adopters, employee comments and exhaustive analysis on the performance of individual questions. The model also expanded to 50 question pairs, enabling two sets to be rotated every six months. The adoption of the revised model saw an initial uplift in adoption and a slower drop off rate for new adopters over time.
In 2022, Joyous released a third version as the Te Reo Māori Employee Experience Genome Project V1.0. As a proudly New Zealand organization Joyous worked with our valued partner, Maurea Consulting, to adapt both the model and the Joyous product to support delivering the model in dual language side-by-side. This was the same 50 question pairs as version 2.0, with some further improvements to the english questions based on feedback and in-line Te Reo Māori versions to support our Kiwi customers in helping to uplift Māori cultural competency.
Over the course of 2022 to 2025, most Joyous customers shifted away from weekly conversations between managers and employees. Today, nearly all Joyous HR customers use a combination of quarterly surveys and action focused campaigns - following the current Joyous HR Engagement Model, outlined in this article.
The EX Genome model has been adapted and refined over the last three years to suit this approach and been renamed to the Joyous HR Engagement Model and action-focused campaign templates targeting specific topics were added to compliment the surveys. This version is not Open Source.
Joyous supports a variety of question types and features to suit different goals — from measuring engagement to collecting targeted, actionable feedback. Three core question types are used in the Joyous HR Engagement Surveys and Campaigns.
A 10 minute assessment (29 questions) of work experience, suitable for annual measurement across engagement, well-being, culture & environment and fairness & inclusion.
Download the template in an excel workbook here.
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A medium length (13 questions) assessment of work experience, suitable for six monthly or annual measurement across engagement, well-being, culture & environment and fairness & inclusion.
A short assessment (6 questions) of work experience, suitable for quarterly measurement.
Targeted conversational campaigns focused on specific improvements on topics such as: Environment, Growth, Role Support & Strategy.
Approach:
Action focused campaigns should only be run one to three months before the organization intends to take action on a focused topic. They are a fast and meaningful way to gather specific actionable ideas from people. This greatly helps improve the quality, awareness and adoption of the prioritised actions.
Download the template in an excel workbook here.
And there you have it! If you made it this far, well done! You now have a comprehensive understanding of how Joyous recommends approaching HR and Engagement with our Employee Experience (EX) product.
Rest assured, your account manager will partner with you on your journey and you will be supported at every step. We are here to work alongside you and will tailor our approach to suit your unique requirements and culture.
If you have any feedback or questions don't hesitate to reach out to your account manager directly.
Ruby is a comedian-turned engineer, previously leading product at two global tech companies, she has been CEO at Joyous for 4 years. Her passion for making a positive impact on people’s lives is perfectly matched with the mission of Joyous to make life better for people at work.
She enjoys working across all parts of the organization and is passionate about product direction and data science.
She is the co-author of Joyfully, a book about shared leadership, modern organizational structures, and a new way of working. Her second book Pathways, is a guide to help woman and other under-represented people get a job in technology in six months or less.
She was the Winner of the Product Category for Women Leading Tech Australia 2022 and a finalist in the Inspiring Individual Category of the HiTech awards in 2023.