45 Employee Spotlight Questions: Guide to Success

Employee spotlights are employee profiles used by organizations to highlight the success, skills, and personalities of their employees. Built from a mix of professional and personal questions, they provide employees with a meaningful way to connect and celebrate.

Featured in newsletters, intranet posts, company websites, or social media platforms, spotlights provide a glimpse into an individual’s role, their journey within an organization, and their interests or hobbies.

They are a great way to highlight the achievements of existing employees or introduce new employees. They help employees feel more connected to their roles, workplace, and colleagues.

So how do you get the most out of employee spotlights?

It’s all about the employee spotlight questions.

Contents

• Benefits of employee spotlights

• How to create an effective employee spotlight

• Employee spotlight questions

• Promoting your spotlights

• Measuring the impact

Benefits of employee spotlights

There are numerous positive impacts a well-executed employee spotlight program can bring to an organization:

Fostering a positive work culture

When an organization is committed to creating a positive culture it can be seen through leadership, strategy, and outcomes. Initiatives like employee spotlights, make employees feel good. Gallup research shows that recognition is most effective when it is fulfilling, authentic, personalized, equitable, and embedded in company culture.

Recognizing and appreciating employee efforts

Employee recognition is a powerful tool. According to a study by NectarHR, “71% of employees would be less likely to leave their organization if they were recognized more frequently”. Regular employee spotlights can support your recognition and retention efforts by helping employees feel connected to their organization.

Your organization should use recognition to reflect your culture, goals, and values.

Attracting talent

Candidates applying for positions within your organization will research your company’s website, social media, and general online presence. Coming across employee spotlights shows them the type of colleagues they may work with, and it shows them that your organization cares about its employees.

How to create an effective employee spotlight

Once you have decided on the selected employee/s who you want to highlight- there are several key aspects to an effective employee spotlight:

1. Design – Regularly producing employee spotlights requires templates. Work with designers to produce the relevant collateral depending on your communication channels. By producing templates it will help you to streamline this process and make the creation easier.

   Whether it’s an image or video template with eye-catching designs, your employees will look forward to reading them.

2. Conduct interviews – Don’t just send a list of questions and request a picture of your chosen employee. Create time for an interview with the employee, 15-30 minutes is enough time to go over employee spotlight questions and get to know the employee better.

   Ask relevant and open-ended questions to get a mix of personal and professional answers. Remember to conduct the interview in a comfortable, quiet place, listen actively, take notes, and thank the employee for their time. After the interview, collate your notes and the content so it’s ready for design treatment.

3. Adaptability – Ensure the spotlights are not only adaptable when it comes to different content formats but also adaptable to your people. Personalize the spotlight to the employee with the types of questions you ask, perhaps the employee mentions something interesting, you can always ask follow-up questions.

   If an employee seems uncomfortable with a certain question, respect their comfort zone, and move on to the next question. It’s important to be inclusive and sensitive to people of all backgrounds.

4. Purpose – Remember the purpose of your employee spotlight and this will guide its creation. You may be highlighting achievements, introducing a new hire, or breaking down cross-department silos but ultimately you are trying to make an employee feel connected and celebrated.

Implement these best practices and all you'll have to do is: interview and connect with your people, fill out engaging templates, promote and celebrate them routinely, and watch the good vibes grow.

Employee spotlight questions

1. How did you get into this field/industry?

2. What does a typical day look like for you?

3. What do you enjoy most about your job?

4. What has been your most memorable moment at the company so far?

5. What’s the biggest challenge you’ve faced in your role and how did you overcome it?

6. What’s one thing you wish people knew about your job?

7. What’s the best piece of professional advice you’ve ever received?

8. How has your role evolved since you started at the company?

9. What’s one project or achievement you’re particularly proud of?

10. If you could switch roles with anyone in the company, who would it be and why?

11. How do you stay motivated at work?

12. What’s your favorite part about the company culture?

13. What’s one thing you’re currently learning or want to learn?

14. What’s your go-to productivity trick?

15. How do you like to unwind after a busy day at work?

16. What are the top 3 emojis you use the most?

17. What’s one thing you can’t work without?

18. What’s your favorite workspace or spot in the office?

19. What’s your favorite company event or team outing you’ve attended?

20. What’s a book or podcast you’d recommend to others and why?

21. What’s a skill or hobby you have outside of work?

22. What’s your favorite lunch spot or snack?

23. What’s a fun fact about you that your colleagues might not know?

24. What’s your favorite way to give or receive feedback?

25. What’s a goal or dream you have for your career?

26. What’s your favorite way to start the day?

27. What’s a cause or organization you’re passionate about and why?

28. What’s your favorite memory from your time at the company?

29. What’s a lesson you’ve learned from a colleague?

30. What’s one thing you’re excited about in the coming year at work?

Here are 15 fun employee spotlight questions to help reveal more insights

31. If you could have dinner with anyone, living or dead, who would it be and why?

32. What’s the most interesting place you’ve ever visited?

33. If you could learn any skill instantly, what would it be?

34. What’s your favorite movie or book and why?

35. If you were stranded on a deserted island, what three items would you want to have with you?

36. What’s the most daring thing you’ve ever done?

37. If you could have any superpower, what would it be and why?

38. What’s your go-to karaoke song?

39. If you could live in any era, which would it be and why?

40. What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever received?

41. Where did you grow up?

42. What is the best holiday you have ever been on?

43. What’s something you’re obsessed with currently?

44. If you could only listen to one artist/bank for the rest of your life, who would it be?

45. Where do you see yourself in two years?

Promoting your spotlights

There is a variety of ways to share employee spotlights: email, messaging channels (e.g. Slack or Teams), newsletters, intranet posts, company websites, social media platforms, desktop alerts, or employee apps.

The trick for getting higher levels of engagement is aligning the channels with your audience. Your employees will have preferred channels, frequency, tone, and formats. If you’re unsure of these preferences, you can survey employees to gather feedback from them.

You can also experiment with different communication channels, methods, and formats to see how employees react. Adapt and be flexible with your audience as their communication preferences may change over time.

Measuring the impact

Track engagement through views, likes, reactions, comments, shares, or time spent reading.

Survey employees to gather feedback about their thoughts on employee spotlights. Do they like reading them? How is the message frequency? Any suggestions for improvement?

Ask featured employees about their experience. Did they feel recognized? Did they receive any feedback or comments from their peers?

Monitor retention and referral rates before and after implementing your employee spotlight program.

While these metrics can provide some insight into the impact of the spotlights, the true value is in the intangible benefits like increased camaraderie, understanding, and respect among your team.

Employee Spotlights serve as a powerful tool for any organization aiming to foster a positive and engaging work culture.

By recognizing and appreciating the hard work and dedication of employees, these spotlights not only boost morale but also encourage a sense of belonging and loyalty. They send a clear message that employee contribution is valued, creating an environment where employees feel seen, heard, and appreciated.

You can create employee spotlight templates in SnapComms to help streamline the creation and promotion of your spotlights.

From employee newsletters, desktop alerts, screensavers, and the employee app, there are a variety of engaging channels you can utilize.