Blog Post

A (long) while ago I started ‘talking’ about simple steps that anyone can do to deploy an effective survey.  In past blogs I’ve talked about:

• Determining the Objective(s)
• Obtaining Commitment
• Determining the Deployment Method for the Survey, and
• Identifying the Survey Respondents
• Survey Construction
• Survey Administration
• Analysis and Reports

What happens after analysis?

Communicate the Survey Results

As stated above, it is important how you communicate the results of the survey to your stakeholders, and, depending on your agreement, to the respondents who participated in the survey. Communicating the results to the respondents reinforces that their input was used. Communicating the results to the respondents can also increase expectation as to improvements that might have been suggested and may affect future participation.

Create Action Plans

The point at which surveys prove their value is when the information that you have gathered is used in a constructive way to improve operations, products, programs, offers, etc. Developing an action plan helps implement those improvements. An action plan should include:

• An evaluation of survey data and consensus of what action needs to be taken, and with what priority.
• A listing of activities that need to be carried out for each priority item.
• The names of the people responsible for implementing the plan.
• A timeline for each plan’s accomplishment.

Once you put the action plan in place, it is important to periodically re-visit the plan. Be sure that the work is getting done. At some point, you can re-survey and evaluate if the areas identified as action items are actually improving.

Planning and commitment

Successful surveys require planning and a commitment from all parties involved. By following these nine steps you can make the process of designing, administering and analyzing surveys a positive one. In the end, you will obtain valuable and desirable information from your survey respondents that may be used as the foundation for decisions within your company. These steps will hopefully make your job less stressful and your life a little easier.