Similarly, when undertaking a Six Sigma project, team leaders may undertake some surveys to understand the areas where it can be implemented, to understand resistance, and to understand customer requirements and many other issues of relevance.

Let’s look at a few things that can be done to ensure surveys are without mistakes and drawbacks.

Surveys Should Have Measurable Goals

Surveys are generally undertaken with an aim to assist in decision-making. It is necessary for surveys to have clear, defined and measurable goals that are directly linked to organizational goals.

Survey goals can be categorized as effective and non-effective goals. Effective goals will be those that have a very specific aim such as the best allocation of limited amount of resources. Non-effective surveys are like those undertaken by governments, which are typically based on satisfaction grades of departments.

The results of such surveys may be put to little use and may not impact the organization’s future policies.

Survey Only If You Can Deliver

Surveys are mostly undertaken by an organization to understand the customer’s needs.  Surveys should be designed so that they do not raise the customer’s expectations.

Additionally, if the service being provided is poor, then asking about new improved services can be damaging, as the customer would lose faith in the company entirely.

If a company is not committed to providing anything of value, then a survey may be counter-productive, and the organization may end up losing the customer due to its inability to provide.

Ensure A Representative Sample

The representative samples for the survey should be relevant. It may so happen that the organization is surveying people who are least related to the issue. This is akin to asking a non-user of mobile phones about improvements in their features.

Another aspect is that the pollsters create samples which may be devious. This is like asking the same respondent the same question over and over again. This is a biased sample, and does not hold any relevant information for the Six Sigma initiative.

Make Sure The Respondents Can Answer

There are times when the respondents are unable to respond or may not have answers relevant to the questions.

If an organization is aiming at understanding a particular issue and has some specific responses in mind for analysis, then it may be worthwhile to provide them those optional answers.

Design The Questionnaire Carefully And Clearly

The questionnaire should be constructed carefully. If there are typical norms of scaling that are normally followed or are usually used in the market, then it is better to use those, rather than framing something new.

This is because customers are generally used to some format, and changing that format may not be a safe bet to get the correct response. For example, scaling is normally done, where the number 1 stands for the best. If you a scale of 1 to 5, where 5 is the best, then the chances of errors on the part of respondents is higher.

It is also necessary that you frame your questions carefully, clearly and in simple terms.

Surveying is not an easy task, and requires using proper methods and questionnaires to get the most effective answers for correct data analysis. It is a job done by experienced people, which prove to be as effective as possible.