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4/3/2018 Turning a Negative (Review) into a Positive : HRExecutive.com

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Behind the Curtain

HR professionals can use negative reviews posted on

online job sites to make positive workplace changes.

By: Carol Patton (http://hrexecutive.com/author/carol-patton/) | April 3, 2018 • 9

min read

Topics: HR Technology (http://hrexecutive.com/category/hrtechnology/) |

Recruiting (http://hrexecutive.com/category/talentmanagement/recruiting/) |

Talent Management (http://hrexecutive.com/category/talentmanagement/) | Top

Stories (http://hrexecutive.com/category/hpb/hpb-top-stories/)

As executive vice president of global HR at Protiviti, Scott Redfearn getspinged several times a day by email alerts from the job site Glassdoor,notifying him that an employee posted an online comment about hisconsulting firm, which supports 5,000 employees in approximately 75countries.

“With negative reviews, we find that often employees need to let offsome steam,” he says. “We step back and look for overall trends todetermine whether there is some underlying issue that we should besensitive to.”

Most companies receive negative reviews—whether they admit it ornot. Across all industries, employees post their opinions about theiremployment experiences on many job sites, covering topics rangingfrom their boss or job responsibilities to workplace environment. Theircomments are not always productive or even accurate and, sometimes,are quite painful to read. Consider this employee’s post: “Unstructuredenvironment, no processes in place, everything is done withoutthinking it through, zero company culture.”



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Ouch. Still, negative commentsshould never be ignored and must beroutinely monitored—since they canhelp improve your workplaceculture, people and practices.

Typically, four HR staff members atProtiviti monitor job sites for allemployee reviews—good or bad. Forcomments where a response isrequired, one is always given, eitherby HR or a representative of the

department involved. Redfearn says those responding always thank theindividuals for posting their comments, correct false assumptions andencourage employees who posted the comments to follow up bydiscussing their issue directly with an employee, such as a supervisor.

But some employers simply look the other way and ignore negativefeedback. Bad idea. Redfearn says negative employee comments are notonly accessible to the employer, but also to thousands, even millions, ofother workers, and potential candidates.

“This feedback is visible for job candidates that you’re trying to hire,”Redfearn says. “If you don’t stay on top of it, don’t respond, it gets to bemore of a daunting task [to manage].”

He adds that HR should encourage employees to comment on theirwork experience. “Let the chips fall where they may,” he says and, in theend, the feedback will “lift the work experience for your people andimprove their morale and engagement.”

At Nestle Purina PetCare in St. Louis, Steve Degnan, vice president ofHR, says roughly 7 percent of the company’s 200 reviews each year arenegative, which he calls “clinkers.”

Transparency is a big deal at the company, says Degnan, who overseesapproximately 7,000 U.S. employees at the company and thousandsmore throughout North and South America. The employees whorespond to reviews vary depending on the topic. It may be a departmenthead, someone from the talent-acquisition team or even Degnanhimself. But the approach is consistent.

“The strategy is honesty and authenticity,” he says, adding thatcomments—positive or negative—may address terminations, politics,personality conflicts or frustration with promotions and are publishedin the employee newsletter.

Although some reviews appear to have no factual basis, Degnan believesthey usually contain one kernel of truth. The takeaway, he says, is toperceive job sites as free engagement surveys that offer instantaneous



data about your organization. Reviews generally offer valuableinformation to companies about blind spots, enabling them to fix orrepair issues and better recruit and retain skilled workers.

Influential and Powerful

Make no mistake: Online reviews can either attract job candidates orpush them elsewhere.

Glassdoor, for instance, sees an average of 50-million unique users eachmonth. In nearly a decade, several-million employees have postedcompany reviews on the job site. Although the majority (73 percent)rated their employer with three stars or above using a five-star system,27 percent of companies fell below three stars. Based on Glassdoor’s2017 survey, 48 percent of its users read at least seven reviews beforeforming an opinion of a company.

Another job site—kununu—also invites employee feedback. Out of itsnearly 600,000 reviews on 300,000 U.S. companies during the past twoyears, 42 percent of companies fell below three stars (out of five),according to a report released in February, says Moritz Kothe, thecompany’s CEO. The three lowest-rated industries include medicaltechnology/biotechnology (averaging 2.77 stars), printing/packagingfood and beverage items (averaging 2.76 stars) and manufacturing(averaging 2.73 stars). However, negative reviews have been on thedecline, going from 66 percent in February 2016 to 51 percent thefollowing year.

Count on negative reviews impairing your recruiting efforts. Last year,an auto supplier received bad reviews from temporary workers onvarious job sites. John Malloy, president of executive-search firmSanford Rose Associates in Santee, S.C., was tasked with recruiting anaccountant for the organization.

But candidates kept turning him down because of the online negativecomments.

“Rather than walk away, we had to give them a pretty strong sales pitchabout how the company made major changes,” he says. “People whoknew us understood but were still skeptical. We took what was a totallyblack attitude and created a gray perception. It’s taking a long time torebuild their reputation.”

Since most job candidates log online to read company reviews, Malloysays, it’s critical for employers to encourage employees to not onlywrite honest reviews of their work experiences, but to include “realpizzazz.” Skilled employees or job candidates need to see those types ofcomments online before accepting a position.



Meanwhile, to prevent being surprised by online comments,consistently ask employees about their work experiences. Considersoliciting feedback at town halls, during exit interviews or performancereviews and even when communicating with retirees. If people believetheir complaints are being heard and resolved, they’re less likely to postnegative reviews.

However, Malloy says, employee comments are often distorted, makingit very “dangerous” to defend yourself. For instance, he says, consider acompany responding to a comment about a bad supervisor, stating itwill “correct the situation.” Then imagine the supervisor reading thecomment. No one wins. Instead, Malloy says, flip the comment aroundand reply with something positive.

“One of the things we’re really harping on with our clients is to have aregular set of [honest] positives on social media,” he says, adding thatpositive and negative reviews tend to balance each other out. “It’s not amatter of hoping your employees do it … . There’s got to be a strongcampaign to make sure that occurs.”

Opportunity for Improvement

Reviews are oftentimes used to improve in-house practices. At Protiviti,each negative comment is sent to the department or employeeaddressed in the review. It’s evaluated and then a response is drafted ifone is warranted.

The feedback has helped HR make some changes to the company’sbenefit programs. As a result of online employee reviews, the companyenriched its parental-leave policies and increased its 401(k) match.

When employees at Nestle Purina posted their perceptions about thelong wait for employee promotions, Degnan says, HR developedcommunication initiatives to help employees better understand itstalent-management and associate-advancement process andrecommended options to better engage supervisors on the topic.

Likewise, American Public University System, a private onlineuniversity in Charles Town, W. Va., that employs 2,808 faculty and staff,receives approximately three positive and two negative reviews everyweek.

The school is strengthening its communications tactics due toemployee comments about insufficient communication about schoolchanges, says Amy Panzarella, senior vice president of HR andcommunity relations at the school.

“When there’s a change in motion … we need to make sure that we do astellar job of communication—in person and email,” she says. “It mightbe ad nauseam but we’re going to [repeatedly] say it so that[employees] are very clear as to what lies ahead.”



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Broad vs. Targeted Responses

Although negative reviews are oftenconsidered a “hot potato,” Protivitiresponds to every one of them thatcalls for a response, says Redfearn.

One employee posted his opinionabout the company’s vacationbenefits, stating that they were“inferior.”

“We saw this as a chance to tell ourside of the story, present an alternate point of view related to the facts,”he says, explaining that all comments not addressed by the companycould be considered factually correct by a job site’s visitors. “We won’tlet the word ‘inferior’ stand without at least presenting what our paid-time-off benefits actually are.”

Panzarella at APUS has also assigned several of her staff to monitor allcompany reviews on various job sites. They escalate all negative reviewsthat involve employees or job candidates to her and also partner withmarketing to draft responses.

However, she says, the majority of responses tend to be broad instead ofdirected toward individuals. For example, in January, the schoolextended its customer-service hours since the majority of its 65,000

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students work full time while some live in different countries.

Although this change was communicated to employees over manymonths, she says, some employees posted negative comments abouthow the school was creating a call-center environment. HR worked withmarketing to craft a positive response that addressed how theadditional service hours appealed to students, better accommodatedtheir needs and reflected the school’s customer service-oriented brand.

In another review, an employee commented on the high cost of theschool’s benefits. HR again responded generically by stating howgenerous and competitive the benefits package was for the industry andarea. Panzarella says this approach repositions negative comments in apositive light by introducing facts.

“Our role in this organization … is to really take stock in thosereactions,” she says, adding that negative reviews are typically moreabout employee perception than reality. “Instead of taking it personally,look at [negative reviews] as an opportunity to reiterate how you feelabout employees and the value they add to the organization.”

Carol Patton is a contributing editor for HRE who also writes HR articles and

columns for business and education magazines. She can be reached at

[email protected].

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