By Melynnie Rizvi
At SurveyMonkey, our goal has always been to make the communities where we live and work better, safer, and healthier. And as a survey company, we’re uniquely suited to help. Throughout the crisis, we’ve poured resources into not only supporting our employees and customers, but also helping build a better world at large.
Here are the ways that we’re looking out for our users, our employees, and everyone else who’s been affected by these tumultuous times.
Providing Free Public Resources for Organizations of Every Size
Every company and organization has been affected by the virus. Many are suddenly and urgently coping with less revenue, while also trying to keep business operations going in a quarantining world.
SurveyMonkey launched new, free survey templates designed by our in-house survey experts to help business leaders and individual managers stay connected. Our Coronavirus Leadership Check-In template enables executives and small business owners to assess employees’ wellbeing and address potential challenges, our Work From Home template enables individual managers to check up on employees at a regular cadence, and our B2B customer pulse survey enables users to check on customers.
SurveyMonkey is also constantly publishing new research about social sentiments around the coronavirus, including the number of people quarantining, top concerns, changes in buying habits and more. Since February, we’ve polled more than 600,000 people across the U.S., U.K., and Canada. We publish this data weekly to help bring more clarity about these world changes to our customers and other readers.
Supporting our Nonprofit Partners
SurveyMonkey is currently offering extreme discounts to nonprofits, educators, and students to enable them to continue their important work and enable remote education.
And the work that we’re seeing from nonprofits truly is inspirational. Here are a few examples: the American Red Cross is using SurveyMonkey technology to recruit blood donors who have already recovered from the virus (and therefore have coronavirus-fighting antibodies in their blood), so that sick people can recover more effectively. Meanwhile, the Boys and Girls Club of San Mateo uses SurveyMonkey to check in on community needs, and created a food distribution station for needy families as a result of their research.
We’re also promoting broader use of SurveyMonkey Contribute, a platform that enables people to take surveys in exchange for a SurveyMonkey-sponsored donation to a nonprofit of their choice. For every survey taken, SurveyMonkey donates 50 cents, many of which—like Doctors without Borders and American Red Cross.—are directly supporting virus relief efforts. Our hope is that people can use SurveyMonkey Contribute to help support positive change, even if they can’t afford to give money themselves during this time. Historically, the platform has raised over 15 million dollars for worthy causes.
Enabling Healthcare Breakthroughs and Other Research
Some of SurveyMonkey’s most exciting work right now comes from partnerships with healthcare and other public health organizations.
COVID Near You is an organization that is tracking symptoms across the U.S., Canada, and Mexico, helping communities understand whether they are at risk and how the virus works. It provides real-time public health updates using survey data. Almost 600,000 people have made reports to the site in order to help spread awareness.
Another powerful new partnership is with the state of Rhode Island, which is using SurveyMonkey to check in on people who tested positive, track changes in symptoms, identify problem areas where illness is spreading, and research possible solutions.
Taking Care of Our Troop
The health and safety of our employees (affectionately known as our Troop) remains a top priority at SurveyMonkey. That’s why SurveyMonkey was among the first companies to implement a work-from-home policy in early March 2020, helping establish the norm that is attributed to saving lives in California before the state safer-at-home order was in place.
During this time of instability, SurveyMonkey has strengthened our commitment to protect our employees. Our CEO, Zander Lurie, took a public pledge to do no layoffs for 90 days starting April 1, and we are committed to paying hourly workers and contractors their regular wages, despite a decreased need for services.
As we began remote work, one of our first steps was to check in with our Troop to understand their concerns and the support tools that would help them navigate this new landscape, using our leadership check in template. Based on their feedback, and in recognition of the challenges associated with caregiving and homeschooling, we provided all employees with a stipend to set up a comfortable and effective remote workspaces and help support childcare, dependent care, educational learning subscriptions, and more. We also added emergency paid sick leave for any employee who is personally affected by the virus, so that they won’t be depleting any sick days.
We sent our Employee Resource and Social Impact Groups (ERG & DIGs) the guidance and resources they need to host virtual events and Community Chats to maintain connection, collaboration and morale during this time of physical distancing. These groups are also tackling the new challenges facing individual communities at this time, including xenophobia and racism against the Asian American community, the disproportionate health and economic impact the virus is having on the African American and Latinx communities, and the mental health impact of this new world order.
Additional Advocacy
In addition to our CEO’s pledge not to do any layoffs for 90 days, SurveyMonkey has been involved in other social initiatives that aim to support our communities through this crisis.
To support small businesses that are particularly vulnerable during this time, SurveyMonkey joined the #OpenWeStand Coalition of more than 30 companies to help small businesses sustain during and recover after from the financial impact of COVID-19.
Before becoming law on March 18, 2020, SurveyMonkey advocated for the passage of the Families First Coronavirus Response Act, which provides funding for free coronavirus testing, 14-day paid leave for American workers affected by the pandemic, and increased funding for food stamps.
Like everyone else, SurveyMonkey has had its share of challenges in a rapidly changing world. But we truly believe that we can work together to make a positive impact, and we commit to continue working toward that impact in whatever ways we can.
