Colorado Releases Results Of State Worker Survey

DENVER (CBS4) - How do you feel about your job? Colorado state workers were asked that question a couple months ago and now the answers have been made public.

Nearly 100,000 state employees were given a survey to find out how they feel about their jobs. About 20,000 took the survey.

"Generally speaking I think the survey was good and I think the results were good," said Kathy Nesbitt, Director of Personnel Administration. "In fact, there were a couple of places where there was 100 percent favorability in some of the results. So overall I think it was very good."

Nesbitt shared the results with CBS4. The nearly 60 question survey asked state employees to rate different areas of their job as favorable or unfavorable.

"We asked things like, 'How well do you feel like your work is being done? Do you have the right resources to get the job completed? '" she said. "Overall are people happy working for the state? I would say so. Yes."

Ninety-three percent of employees feel their work is important. Eighty-three percent feel they're held accountable for their results and 79 percent feel accomplished on the job.

The state didn't do so well in other areas. Forty-six percent of employees feel their ideas aren't acted on. Forty-five percent aren't satisfied with advancement opportunities and 35 percent don't feel their leaders give them direction.

"I think we're about average or a little bit over average. So I would say a 'C.' But I think we have a great opportunity to quickly move to a 'B.'"

Nesbitt is satisfied with the results from the 31 page report and even though she gives the state a passing grade, she believes there is still room for improvement.

"I would say that if we all focus on at least one or two things to improve upon we can probably move the metric to be a 'B' in those one or two things."

Nesbitt hopes to do the survey again in the next two years. She hopes to report a B average the next time around.

Each worker's responses are kept anonymous.