Company culture can make or break your employee experience — but how often do you stop to really assess it?
A company culture assessment helps you move past the guesswork. No more relying on vibes, exit interviews, or hoping the all-hands chat isn’t a minefield. It’s a clear look at what your culture actually feels like, and where it’s helping or hurting.
And it’s worth the effort. According to SHRM, employees in positive cultures are almost 4x more likely to stay. That’s a clear competitive edge.
In this guide, we’ll walk you through how to run a company culture assessment that gets real results — complete with tools, smart questions, and practical tips to turn insights into action.
How to run a company culture assessment
Culture isn’t just what’s written on the wall; it’s how people actually work together, make decisions, and show up every day. And if you want to understand it, you have to assess it with intention.
That doesn’t mean launching a months-long initiative with a 90-slide deck. A good company culture assessment is focused, honest, and built to spark action. Here’s how to get started:
1. Define your objectives
Start by getting clear on what you’re trying to learn, and why. Are you looking to improve engagement, reduce turnover, or measure alignment with company values? Your goals should shape how you design the assessment, what questions you ask, and how you interpret the results.
Be specific. “Improve culture” is too vague. But “understand why engagement is dipping in frontline teams” or “see how well our values are showing up in daily behaviors” gives you something to actually work with. Without a clear goal, all you’ve got is a pile of data and a headache.
2. Choose an assessment strategy
Different goals call for different tools, but the best culture assessments combine scale with depth. That means using both quantitative and qualitative approaches to get a full picture.
You might start with a quick survey to gather baseline sentiment, then follow up with:
- Manager-led conversations or skip-level chats
- Focus groups for deeper insights
- One-on-ones for candid feedback
- Behavioral data from performance tools or a fully-integrated recognition platform
3. Collect and analyze data
Now’s the time to listen — actively, and with an open mind. Make it easy for employees to share their experience, regardless of role, language, or location. That might mean mobile-accessible feedback tools, anonymous feedback options, and flexible ways for employees to share their experiences wherever they work.
Once the data’s in, don’t just skim the highlights. Dig into patterns, gaps, and outliers. What’s driving high scores in one department and dragging down another? Where are your values showing up in action, and where are they falling flat?
4. Create an action plan
Insight without action is just another report collecting dust. Use what you’ve learned to prioritize a few high-impact areas. Then build a plan with clear owners, timelines, and steps — even small changes can make a big difference when they’re intentional.
Don’t do it alone. Involving employees in the process builds trust, accountability, and a stronger connection to the outcomes. After all, it’s their culture, too.
5. Monitor and evaluate
Culture is ongoing, evolving, and influenced by everything from leadership behavior to how teams recognize each other.
That’s why the assessment isn’t the final step. Keep checking in with pulse surveys and regular feedback loops. Track what’s improving, where things are stalling, and what’s getting quietly ignored. And when you do make progress? Call it out. Recognition helps turn positive shifts into lasting habits — and shows your people that culture isn’t just something you talk about. It’s something you live.
Company culture assessment tools and methods
Culture isn’t something you can measure with a single survey or gut feeling. It’s layered, messy, and constantly evolving, which is why a mix of tools works best.
Here’s how to get a clear read on what your culture looks like today (not just what you hope it looks like). And yes, Achievers has a few tools up its sleeve to help you get there.
1. Employee communication and feedback tools
The way you communicate day-to-day says more about your culture than any values poster ever could. If your people feel out of the loop or overlooked, it’s not just a communications issue, it’s a culture one.
Achievers’ internal communications tool helps you stay connected, aligned, and transparent (without needing 14 reply-all emails). Use them to:
- Push timely announcements across teams, time zones, and languages
- Send mobile notifications so even your frontline teams don’t miss a beat
- Host central resource hubs for everything from company values to ERG updates
- Tailor messages by location, role, or business unit to keep content relevant
2. Focus groups and interviews
Want the real story behind the engagement score? Just ask. Focus groups and one-on-ones give you the nuance and context that a multiple-choice question just can’t.
Use them to dig into:
- Where values are showing up or going missing
- Why certain teams feel energized while others are just coasting
- How people actually feel about leadership, collaboration, or change
3. Recognition and engagement data
If you really want to know what your culture values, look at what gets recognized. Recognition is behavior data, and it tells you a lot. Who’s being seen (or overlooked)? What’s getting celebrated? Are people reinforcing your values, or just defaulting to “nice job”?
With Achievers, you don’t have to guess. You can track:
- How often recognition happens, and where it’s falling off
- Which behaviors and values are being called out
- Who’s participating, by team, role, or location
- Whether recognition is manager-led, peer-driven, public, or private
And here’s why it matters: according to the Achievers Workforce Institute, 89% of employees who are meaningfully recognized at least monthly say they feel warmly welcomed at their company — whether they’re on day one, joining a new team, or stepping into a new role.
That’s proof that recognition helps people feel more engaged, more motivated, and more likely to do the best work of their lives.
What to assess in a culture check
Not sure where to focus your culture assessment? Start with the basics — the day-to-day stuff that actually shapes how people experience work:
- Values in action: Are company values just something that’s said because it sounds good, or are they showing up in real behavior?
- Leadership and management: Are leaders modeling the culture you say you want?
- Communication and collaboration: Do teams talk to each other or past each other?
- Recognition and rewards: Are people being seen for what they do well, and how often?
- Work-life balance: Is well-being supported, or just lip service?
- Innovation and risk-taking: Can employees share ideas without bracing for impact?
How to take action post-assessment
A culture assessment is only as valuable as what you do next. Here’s how to turn feedback into real change:
- Share the findings: Be transparent about what you heard. Highlight strengths, name the gaps, and explain what comes next. People don’t expect perfection — they expect honesty.
- Involve employees in the follow-up: Invite employees to help shape the response. Co-create action plans with teams, ERGs, or cross-functional groups. The more involved people are, the more they’ll care about the outcome.
- Recognize the behaviors you want more of: Culture shifts when recognition is aligned with values. Use Achievers to spotlight moments that reinforce your desired culture, whether that’s collaboration, innovation, or inclusion.
- Measure as you go: Don’t wait a year to check in again. Use regular follow-ups, pulse-style feedback, and real-time behavior data from recognition trends to track progress and keep momentum.
- Make it strategic: Use your assessment results to help shape larger HR and business decisions — from onboarding and manager development to communication strategy and DEI efforts.
From culture assessment to business impact
When you take time to truly understand how your people experience work, you don’t just uncover issues — you uncover opportunities. For alignment. For connection. For better business outcomes.
Achievers helps you close the loop between insight and action. Our platform makes it easy to gather meaningful employee feedback, reinforce values through recognition, and keep everyone informed and aligned — all in one place. With tools built to drive participation and visibility, you can track real progress, not just intentions — and build a culture that supports a sense of belonging, engagement, and retention at scale.
Because understanding your culture is only half the story. Changing it? That’s where the real impact happens.
Company culture assessment FAQs
