What is the best way as a trainer to get to know your participants and their expectations? The answer is simple: Ask them! The easiest way to do this is through a quiz or a survey before the face-to-face session. In the second part of "Asking Right!" we will explain how to develop a good concept for your questionnaire and formulate great questions.
Here’s a direct link to the first article: Asking Right – Part 1: Choose the Right Question Type
We encounter questionnaires everywhere in our daily lives, printed or increasingly digital: for example, to gather knowledge or opinions or to receive feedback on measures and courses.
Creating a questionnaire is simple – creating a good questionnaire requires planning and consideration of a few rules. If you have ever created a quiz or survey yourself, you probably noticed: Choosing the right questions and formulations is time-consuming and tricky.
Below, I will give you concrete tips for planning and formulating your next questionnaire, always following the guiding principle:
The good questioner is already halfway answered. (Friedrich Nietzsche)
The Concept: Content and Scope of Your Questionnaire
Right at the beginning is the preparation: Think about what purpose your questionnaire should serve and how you should structure it. After all, your participants should enjoy filling out the questionnaire and provide you with valuable answers.
Step 1: What do you want to know?
Setting goals is important to know which questions you should ask. It is essential that you clearly think about WHAT EXACTLY you want to learn: Is it about workplace issues, personal development, or motivation?
An example: You are to conduct training on the topic "Leadership in Teams" with a group of participants from various departments. If you want to prepare by understanding the current knowledge level and what the participants expect, you set yourself the following two goals:
You want to find out the current knowledge level on the topic "Leadership in Teams".
You want to uncover the motivation of the participants to attend your seminar.
Now think about which questions you can ask to achieve these goals. Two suitable questions for this example would be:
Knowledge question: What tasks does a leader have in a team?
Motivation question: What skills would you like to improve by attending the seminar?
Tip: Keep your goals documented in detail and note down what you want to achieve. This way, you can use your notes as a memory aid at any time during the question-finding process.
After the survey, you can derive measures from the goals – for example, develop a seminar plan that corresponds to the participants' current knowledge and expectations.
Step 2: How long should your questionnaire be?
There is a clear rule regarding the scope of your questionnaire: As long as necessary, as short as possible!
Keep the effort for your participants low and make it as easy as possible for them to complete the survey or quiz. Only ask questions that are relevant in this context and for these participants. You can check whether questions are truly relevant based on three criteria:
Can every participant answer this question – or does it only pertain to a specific group?
Can each participant clearly remember the timeframe the question refers to – or is, for example, "10 years ago" too long to remember accurately?
Is the question simple enough that participants can answer it quickly – or too complex that they may lose motivation?
Tip: Ask the simplest and most general questions first to motivate participants to engage right from the start.
Implementation: 3 Tips for Formulating Good Questions
Poorly formulated questions have consequences: Participants answer questions incompletely or not at all, focus on different aspects than intended, or give feedback that isn't helpful to you. Therefore, I will give you three effective tips on how to formulate your questions so that you definitely receive appropriate answers:
Tip 1: Speak like your participants!
Questions with many foreign words or technical terms may be appropriate for one group of participants – but can cause confusion for another group from a different background. Use terms and concepts from your participants' everyday lives! Additionally, avoid overly long sentences.
Poor: "How relevant is the pragmatic execution of directives for you?"
Better: “How important do you find it to carry out tasks purposefully?”
Tip 2: Make it easy for participants!
For your participants to provide the right answers, they must precisely understand what is being asked. When multiple questions are asked in a single sentence, participants may become uncertain and only respond to one of the questions. When in doubt, formulate two separate questions!
Poor: “What expectations do you have for the seminar and for me as a trainer?”
Better: “1. What expectations do you have for the seminar” – “2. What expectations do you have for me as a trainer?”
Tip 3: Don’t influence the answer!
Even though it often happens unconsciously, people tend to let their own opinions or experiences seep into their questions. This influences the answer to the question – and thus renders the answer worthless. Pay attention to a neutral formulation in your questions and keep your own opinion out of it!
Poor: “I think you learned a lot in my seminar. How do you assess your learning success?”
Better: “How do you assess your learning success in this seminar?”
Conclusion: It’s All a Matter of Form!
Creating a good quiz or a suitable survey for your participants is not rocket science. You can do it easily in three steps:
1. Set your own goals. 2. Choose the right question type.
3. Formulate your questions clearly and understandably.
You can read tips on the right selection of question types in the first part of our article series: Asking Right – Part 1: Choose the Right Question Type
Quizzes and surveys can be easily integrated into your training by printing them out for your participants before the session – or you choose the digital way on an online platform, for example, with blink.it.
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