Organizational Diagnostics

Building Decision Readiness

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In the article on "Why Surveys Fail" we suggested that not preparing for the use of the data was the most common flaw in employee surveys.  Without anticipating the eventual decision steps, the entire effort can be squandered.   But building decision readiness is neither simple nor intuitive.  It essentially requires building the project backwards!

Identify the decision purpose of the survey.

When the data is all collected and analyzed, who will be in the room to review the results?  What do you hope they will do once they understand the data? Will it be executives who might set policy or charter further efforts?  HR/OD staff who would design interventions?  Managers who need to change their behavior?  What decisions are they prepared to make?  If there is no live decision option, then don't ask!  What style of presentation will be most intelligible and compelling to them?  Statistical sophistication?  Case studies? Anecdotes?

Challenge the decision-makers to frame the problem as thoroughly as possible.

Almost every organizational problem initially appears as either a skill deficit or a motivation problem.  But most problems are flaws in vision, poor planning, inadequate structure, poor work system design, faulty management practices, or weak culture.  Raise the question of the most likely contributor to the symptoms with which you are concerned! Decision-makers need not agree on the nature of the problem.  They only need to agree on a range of potential contributors among which the survey should provide some discriminating evidence.

Identify the information needed...and who has it.

What do the decision-makers believe they already know (rightly or wrongly) about the issues at hand?  What "most favored assumption" does the data need to analyze?  How would we tell the difference between a skill deficit VS. a structural problem?  Between management practices VS. work system design? Between poor execution VS. poor planning?  Who would have the information needed?  Current employees?  Recently terminated employees?  Customers?

Design the survey to gather just the information needed.

It is tempting to take advantage of doing a survey to gather any "other information" that anyone thinks might be useful.  This is the exact step where the effort loses focus and starts to dissipate. 

Negotiate a decision-making process ahead of time.

The essential task here is to build an awareness among key decision-makers about how to use survey data.  Our strategy is to define a thorough decision as containing all of the following ingredients:

Scope of Response: Should we do nothing?  Should we make adjustments or wholesale redesign?  Should we sidestep the problem as presented and work on other, more causal issues?  

Focus of Response: Is it a company wide problem?  In what system(s) do the symptoms occur most strongly?  Are there certain segments or layers experiencing the problem mores acutely than others?  

Level of Response: Should the solution be driven from the top down? Or from the bottom up?

Integration of Effort: Can this issue be handled separately?   Or should it be linked with other changes?

Type of Response: Does the solution require changing procedures?  Skill development?  System redesign?  Structural changes?  Or major value issues?

Present data around the decision options.

At some point, you typically have to "walk through the data" so everyone feels like they have had a thorough exposure to the data.  But typically they will quickly want some guidance in deciding "what it all means".  This is your opportunity to present the data re-framed around the key decision issues that defined the survey effort initially.  If a concern with eroding morale was part of the reason for the survey, they present a series of options for addressing lowered morale along with the supporting data.  Give the decision-makers a series of decision options, not just a problem more fully described.