Turning Census Data Into Action: Seven Practical Tips for APS Leaders

The annual APS Employee Census is a powerful source of insight that provides a deep look into organisational culture, leadership effectiveness, and the lived experience of staff.  For APS leaders, these are all critical factors in supporting staff performance, wellbeing and connectivity.

But the real challenge begins after the results arrive.

How do you turn a set of data points into a living plan that inspires change?

How do you move beyond compliance to create actions that genuinely improve team engagement, connection, and wellbeing?

With Action Plans now due across many agencies, leaders are being asked to interpret data points and translate them into a plan that is practical, meaningful, and achievable within 12 months.  While not an easy task, when done well, developing a strong Census Action Plan for your team (and hopefully with your team), can become one of the most powerful leadership tools you have.

As you prepare or finalise your plan, here are seven practical tips to help you focus, simplify, and turn your Census data into action.

1. Start with Understanding, Not Assumption

Before you write anything, take time to deeply understand what your Census data is telling you.  Look beyond the surface numbers and examine where your team’s sentiment is strong (whether positive or negative), and where results have shifted since last year.

Ask yourself:

• Where are the outliers or sudden changes?

• What workplace events or factors might have caused them?

• Which results reflect temporary conditions, and which point to enduring cultural issues?

Understanding what has driven your Census results will help you to identify the most impactful focus areas.  If you anticipate similar changes or challenges in the year ahead you need to include actions under each focus area that will prepare your team to navigate these effectively.

2. Bring your team into this process.

While the Census provides valuable data, your staff hold the context behind it. Facilitating a conversation about what’s driving the results will help you distinguish between perception and reality and identify genuine opportunities for improvement.

Be mindful to manage expectations and be clear about what’s in your control and what isn’t. Align any ideas that emerge with your agency’s capacity and leadership appetite for investment. A simple and effective approach is to ask these three questions before deciding on a focus area:

Ask your team:

• Will this improve how we work together?

• Will this address a recurring issue that genuinely needs to be solved?

• Can this action be realistically implemented within 12 months?

By using a consistent decision-making lens like this, you can create an action plan that’s focused, credible, and achievable.

3.  Bring a Practical and Achievable Lens to Your Focus Areas

It is tempting to use Census Action Planning as an opportunity fix everything. However, it is counter-productive to attempt to address every issue raised. Instead, focus on a small number of high-impact areas where change is achievable and meaningful.

In fact, it may not be practical to address the lowest-scoring questions if the underlying causes sit beyond your control. Overall, it is better to focus on shifting areas with neutral or ambivalent sentiment into positive results, rather than trying to lift low scores up to neutral.

Ask yourself:

• Where can you improve mid-range scores (yellow) into high scores (green) through targeted action?

• What are the actions that can be demonstrated quickly, showing your team that you’re committed to acting on their feedback?

• What are the actions that best align with your purpose and strategy?

4. Write Clear Actions if You Want Clear Outcomes

Phrases like “continue to improve…” sound good, but they rarely lead to meaningful change. If you want clear outcomes, you need clear, behavioural actions.

Use these guidelines when writing each initiative:

• Avoid vague language. Be specific about what people will see, hear, or feel when the action is working

• Be realistic. Don’t promise what you can’t deliver

• Think in terms of habits, not tasks. Sustainable change comes from small, repeatable behaviours.

For example:  “Hold monthly collaboration sessions to identify five practical ideas for improving workplace safety in 2026.”

This is specific, measurable, and observable and your team will be able to see it happening. By keeping your actions grounded in real behaviour, you create accountability and momentum.

5. Link Focus Areas to Strategy and Purpose

Your Census Action Plan should connect your team’s daily experience to the agency’s broader goals, strategy and purpose.  When staff see how their work links to organisational purpose, their day-to-day tasks make sense within the bigger picture, and engagement naturally lifts. Leaders can reinforce this by framing each Focus Area within the bigger picture:

Ask yourself:

• How does this contribute to our department’s purpose?

• How does it help us to build the behaviours we need to get our work done?

Creating a clear connection to an overarching purpose matters to staff.  It shows that you’re leading your team forward in a planned way, not just reacting to survey results.

6. Communicate the Action Plan

Leaders often launch their plan with enthusiasm, then move on leaving staff uncertain about what’s actually happening. Communication shouldn’t be a one-off event; it’s the thread that keeps your plan alive throughout the year.

Over the next 12 months, find opportunities to:

• Share your plan openly. Be transparent about what you heard and what you’re doing

• Celebrate small wins. Highlight visible progress and stories of success

• Be honest about challenges. Staff appreciate transparency when things take longer than expected

• Build it into your rhythm. Use existing forums such as team meetings, newsletters, dashboards to provide regular updates

Consistent communication builds trust, maintains momentum, and keeps engagement visible between Census cycles.

7. Bring Your Action Plan to Life Through Leadership Commitment

Real change depends on leadership commitment. Leaders need to agree on scope, accountabilities, investment, and follow-through. Leadership teams need to show staff that Action Plan initiatives are “real work,” not side projects.

Done well, your Action Plan becomes more than a yearly deliverable; it becomes a leadership framework that supports you throughout the year, helping you listen, prioritise, and act with consistency.  When leaders engage deeply with their Census results, they build stronger teams, reinforce alignment with purpose, and contribute to a more connected, resilient APS.

At Artemis Partners, we help APS leaders and teams make this shift by turning data into dialogue, and dialogue into sustainable cultural change. Our work in Communication, Strategy, and Transformation is grounded in helping leaders simplify complexity, engage their people, and make change that lasts.