Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Employee Survey topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Cary employee survey: strong engagement but trust and pay equity flagged as priorities
Summary
An employee engagement survey of Cary Town staff found strong pride and supervisor relationships, but lower trust in the manager’s office, internal communication gaps and recurring concerns about pay equity; consultants recommended near-term actions and a pulse survey to track progress.
A new employee engagement survey presented at Cary Town’s May quarterly showed high overall engagement and pride in the work, coupled with notable concerns about leadership trust, transparency and compensation alignment.
Allison Hutchkins and CRA consultant Kelly Hamrich told council that the survey—completed by about 1,002 employees for a 57% response rate—found more than 75% of respondents expect to remain with the town for two years and that more than 80% say their work gives them a sense of purpose. Hamrich said the survey included 10 focus groups and that qualitative feedback shaped the questionnaire.
But the consultant flagged lower favorability for “town manager’s office” leadership items: “favorability scores topping out at 37% and larger than desirable percentages of strong disagreement for trusting the manager's office leadership,” Hamrich said, noting a substantial “neither agree nor disagree” group that represents a near-term opportunity to rebuild trust.
Compensation and pay equity emerged repeatedly in open-ended responses. Staff summarized the recommendation as a next-step package: restore trust through visible leadership actions, strengthen internal communications and ownership, assess staffing and targeted pay equity concerns, and expand supervisor training and tools to roll employee feedback to senior leaders.
Council follow-up and next steps: leaders asked for an action timeline and public-facing commitments. Staff proposed a 60-day planning window to prioritize CRA’s 20 recommended actions and suggested a shorter ‘pulse’ survey later in the year to track whether changes move the neutral respondents into the favorable bucket.
