Lynn Walters, executive director at Pure, explains why every employer should be listening to what their staff want.

For our region to thrive, we need motivated people with a variety of talent, experience and skills, but most importantly that are motivated to work.

As the leading professional recruiter in the eastern region, our aim is to help organisations create workplaces that are stimulating, motivating and bring out the best in their people.

People are the most important business resource and by understanding them more, organisations will be more profitable, lead more effectively, create brand loyalty, close more deals and do better work. Best Employers Eastern Region helps achieve this and what's more, it's free!

The surveys from 2012 to 2016 have identified trends across the Eastern region.

Are employees less happy?

In past surveys, employees were asked to rate their organisation on a wide range of areas related to the culture and engagement level across the business. We found that employees in 2016 rated their employers slightly lower on every area than in 2012.

One of the reasons for this could be the changing expectations of employees. Since 2012, the power balance has shifted and employees expect far more from their work meaning that organisations now have to work harder to create stimulating environments to retain their staff.

Where do organisations score most highly?

Employees are far more likely to rate their organisation as high on quality, customer focus and team work. These are the same areas that employees feel are most important to the future success of the organisation.

Therefore, employees rate higher on areas they have a direct impact on, rather than areas outside their control, such as clarity of vision and staff autonomy.

What factor appears to be the most important to engage employees?

Having access to senior management seems to have the most positive impact across all the culture and engagement areas.

If the senior management population make time to have informal conversations with their employees, engagement levels are sure to rise.

A simple, low-cost mechanism to motivate their workforce is closer than many senior managers realise.

Best Employers improved

This year, the Best Employers free employee engagement survey has been made simpler to use, easier to customise and provides even more opportunity to highlight the most inspiring employers across Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex and Cambridgeshire.

Through the gold and platinum accreditation, the Eastern region's most successful employers will be showcased, helping them to attract and retain talent and put the region on the map as a great place to work and do business.

As the region's largest independent recruiter we at Pure believe in helping our clients attract and retain the best talent, putting our region on the map as the place to do business.

• Lynn Walters is executive director of recruitment specialists Pure.

• Best Employers Eastern Region was founded by Pure and psychometrics experts Eras Ltd in 2012. In 2018, the survey is being delivered in partnership with Archant, publisher of the Eastern Daily Press and East Anglian Daily Times, and regional law firm Birketts.