Online Survey Tips & Best Practices

Bring yourself back to that crazy geometry teacher in high school. You know, the one that taught you all about derivatives and integrals (a.k.a. calculus class). We’ve all been in a situation where we find ourselves in classes where the instructor seems to be teaching something completely irrelevant.

You’re disengaged, confused, and inefficiently using your time.

In a high school math class this may have not been as big a problem, but when that time means dollars, you start to pay attention. Almost every organization has (or should have) some sort of training program for their new employees. From culture, to processes, to competitors, these weeks and sometimes even months are some of the most valuable for your employees. Training programs lay the foundation for what they will use every day at work. Ensure they will apply the knowledge learned by conducting training evaluation surveys. If you don't use tools such as new hire surveys to ensure they understand, how can you guarantee they will add value to your company? By conducting course evaluations and post-training surveys, you are able to identify and eliminate key problems in the training program and harvest ideas for improvement.

While many organizations are continuously focused on cutting costs, it becomes ever more important during a tight economy. While expensive consultants can do a great job at finding these bottleneck areas, there may be a more economic recession friendly way to cut costs: just ask your employees.

Employees tend to be the largest expense an organization faces and, believe me, they know it. They may be "expensive", but they're worth it. Your workforce is the DNA of your organization, which is why they are the first people to know where minor costs can be eliminated. By asking for employee feedback and suggestions of areas to eliminate expenses, you are identifying expenses that wont affect their productivity. For example, you may offer employees complimentary snacks and beverages to keep them going through that afternoon hunger. However, an employee opinion survey may show employees think the organization should cut out the snacks in an effort to cut costs. It wouldn't be what you expect, but it's certainly a real-life example.

So the next time you're trying to cut costs due to a shrinking budget, survey your employees. You may just find out that the cookies and soda aren't as important to them as keeping their job.