Survey Feedback as an Intervention in Organizational Change: Effective Discussions Involving All Parties on the Basis of a Questionnaire (2005)
An article about how to structure the discussion of the results and the role of the consultant who leads that discussion. It analyses the example of how the Change Monitor helps a team at an elementary school discuss the structural change that is taking place there.
Original Dutch reference: Bennebroek Gravenhorst, K.M. (2005). Survey-feedback als interventie bij organisatieverandering. Effectieve gesprekken tussen alle betrokkenen naar aanleiding van een vragenlijst. M&O Tijdschrift voor Management en Organisatie, 59, 8-25.
Survey research is popular in organizations. It is inexpensive and it provides an abundance of relevant information about things like how an organization is functioning or how satisfied the employees are. It is an easy way to present standardized questions to large numbers of people. The results are easy to quantify and to compare. They give an idea of the current situation, of any differences between departments and organizations and of the developments that have taken place since a previous measurement. The possibility of offering surveys via the Internet helps simplify the research process.
But what do you do once the situation in an organization has been measured? It is sad to see how much time and energy people put into survey research but how little they do with the results. Measurement information turns out to be difficult to use, and the contribution of survey research towards actually improving problems is minor at best. The management has relevant information, but either doesn’t know what to do with it or simply continues on its earlier course. Employees make an effort and offer their opinions, but they see little in return and feel they have not been taken seriously. The response rate will drop in the following study, and people will start to have doubts about the effectiveness of the survey research.
But there are alternatives. Survey feedback is a special way of working with surveys. The goal of this article is to show what survey feedback entails and how the intervention can contribute to improvements in organizations. Survey feedback is a useful alternative to survey research and has a clear added value. Professional supervision from a consultant is one of the conditions for an effective use of the intervention.