What is the best way for a trainer to get to know your participants and their expectations? The answer is simple: Ask them! This is easiest done through a quiz or a survey before the scheduled date. In the second part of “Asking correctly!” we will explain how to develop a good concept for your questionnaire and how to formulate great questions.

Here’s a direct link to the first article: Asking correctly – Part 1: Choose the right question type

We encounter questionnaires everywhere in our daily lives, printed or increasingly digital: for example, to collect knowledge or opinions or to obtain feedback on measures and courses.

Creating a questionnaire is easy – building a good questionnaire requires planning and adherence to a few rules. If you have ever created a quiz or survey yourself, you probably have noticed: Choosing the right questions and formulations is time-consuming and tricky.

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

At the very beginning is preparation: Think about what purpose your questionnaire should serve and how you should structure it. After all, your participants should also 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 what questions you should ask. It’s crucial that you think about WHAT EXACTLY you want to find out: Is it about problems in the workplace, personal development, or motivation?

An example: You are to conduct a training session on “Leadership in Teams” with a group of participants from different departments. If you want to know in advance what the learning status is and what the participants expect, you set the following two goals:

1. You want to find out the knowledge level on the topic of “Leadership in a team.”

2. You want to uncover the participants' motivation to attend your seminar.

Now think about what questions you can use to achieve these goals. Suitable questions for this example would be:

1. Knowledge question: What tasks does a leader have in a team?

2. Motivation question: What skills do you want to improve by attending the seminar?

Tip: Document your goals in detail and note what you want to achieve. This way, you can use your notes as a reminder during the question formulation process.

Following the survey, you can derive actions from the goals – for example, developing a seminar plan that matches the learning status and the participants' 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 using three criteria:

1. Can every participant answer this question – or does it only apply to a specific group?

2. Can every participant clearly remember the time period to which the question refers – or is, for example, “10 years ago” too long to remember accurately?

3. Is the question simple enough that participants can answer it quickly – or is it so complex that they might 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 is unhelpful to you. Therefore, I will give you three effective tips on how to phrase your questions so that they will definitely provide 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 field. Use terms and concepts from your participants' everyday lives! Avoid overly long sentences.

Poor: “How relevant is the pragmatic execution of directives for you?”
Better: “How important do you find it to complete tasks purposefully?”

Tip 2: Make it easy for the participants!

For your participants to provide the right answers, they must clearly understand what is being asked. If there are multiple questions in one sentence, participants may become uncertain and may only answer one of the questions. If in doubt, formulate two separate questions!

Poor: “What expectations do you have of the seminar and me as a trainer?”
Better: “1. What expectations do you have of the seminar?” – “2. What expectations do you have of me as a trainer?”

Tip 3: Do not influence the answer!

Even though it often happens unconsciously, when asking questions, one tends to let their own opinion or experience come into play. This influences the answer to the question – making the answer worthless. Pay attention to a neutral formulation of your questions and leave your own opinion out!

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 achieve this simply in three steps:

1. Set your own goals. 2. Choose the right question type.
3. Formulate your questions clearly and understandably.

Tips for the proper selection of question types can be found in the first part of our article series: Asking correctly – Part 1: Choose the right question type

You can easily integrate quizzes and surveys into your training by printing them out for your participants before the date – or you can choose the digital route on an online platform, for example with blink.it.

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