Using Questionnaires and Observations Chapter 13 Chapter Objectives Learn When and how questionnaires can be used How to develop a questionnaire How scales apply to questionnaires Questionnaire design concepts How to use observation Purpose of Questionnaires Questionnaires are one tool you can use to gather information They allow you to study Attitudes What people say they want Beliefs What people think is actually true Behaviors What the organizational members do Characteristics Properties of people or things Planning for Questionnaire Use Questionnaires can collect vast amounts of data To make most efficient use of a questionnaire consider the following Are the individuals who you need to interview widely dispersed geographically Are there a large number of people involved in the project and you need information about a smaller segment of the group Are you in an exploratory phase for a project Do you need to know all the problems with the current system so you can follow up in interviews Writing Questions Effective questions and questionnaires should Be transparently clear Have an appropriate flow of questions Have an understanding of potential respondent answers Have well planned details on how to administer the questionnaire Writing Questions Open ended questions on a questionnaire Should be written narrow enough to guide responses in a certain direction of optional answers Can provide additional information for exploratory situations Closed questions Should be used when The list of possible answers can be identified The potential answers are all mutually exclusive Choice of words Should use the language of the respondents as possible Reflect the business s terminology for easier understanding Scales Scales are used to provide a measurement or judgement Measurements can take the form of Nominal Ordinal Interval Ratio There are two performance measures in scales Validity Reliability Scale Problems Scales may experience some problems Leniency Occurs when respondents are easy raters Central tendency Occurs when respondents rate everything average Halo effect Occurs when one question influences the answer to the next question Design Concepts A well designed questionnaire should Provide plenty of white space Allow appropriate space for responses Ask respondents to circle their answers Use the questionnaire objectives to help determine the format Be consistent with the questionnaire style More Design Concepts A well designed questionnaire should order questions So the most important questions are listed first To cluster similar content questions together Anticipate the kinds of associations the respondents may make on the questions To list less controversial questions before divisive or inflammatory items Questionnaire Administration Once the questionnaire is designed the next steps are Identify the respondents Determine how to distribute the questionnaire Bring all respondents together at once Hand out questionnaires and take back completed forms Self administration with a centrally located drop off Mail questionnaires with a stated deadline instructions and return postage Administer electronically Observation Observation can provide insight into additional analysis information It can confirm or negate information found from interviews questionnaires or other data gathering methods The process must be structured with a systematic approach to provide interpretable results To perform an observation The purpose of the observation activity must be clearly defined The level of observation details must be established Categories can be used to capture key activities Use appropriate scales checklists and other observation materials Decide when to observe Time and Event Sampling Time Sampling Allows for specific observation intervals to occur at various times Biases can be reduced from just anytime observations It also provides a sample of representative view of activities Event Sampling Allows for observation of an event in its entirety Reduces concerns of piecemeal data collection Combination A combination of both time and event sampling may provide the best observation data Summary Questionnaires are a tool for information gathering The questionnaire design should consider Question development concepts How scales can be used on the questionnaire How to minimize or eliminate problems when constructing scales Good formatting guidelines Questionnaire administration allows for several alternatives Observation is another tool to gather additional data possibly not available through other methods