Survey Fatigue Isn’t real, Bulls**t Survey Fatigue Is

People don’t get tired of surveys, they get tired of being asked questions whose answers don’t seem to matter.

Surveys are one of the quickest, simplest, cheapest, and most effective ways of gathering a lot of information quickly.

They’re easy to administer, easy to answer, and you can pretty much ask whatever you want.

Coupled with the fact that people absolutely love telling others what they think (you just need to check the comments section of literally anything on the internet to corroborate that), surveys should be the best way to get valuable information from your staff.

The only problem is, your staff aren’t answering them.

But why is that?

Is it the dreaded survey fatigue?

Are you asking too many questions?

Are you asking them too often?

Do staff just not care?

Well, to answer this, let’s first get one thing straight from the outset, people will never get tired of telling you what they think, as long as they know you’re listening.

If someone asks me a question, listens to my answer, then acts on it (or at least tells me why they can’t act on it), then I’ll answer questions all day long.

If they ask me a question while scrolling through their phone, grunt a monosyllabic answer and walk off without anything having changed, I’ll be fairly reluctant to take time out of my day to respond the next time they want some info from me.?

The same applies to surveys.

People want to tell you their opinion because they want that opinion to matter.

If they feel like it doesn’t, then what's their incentive to share?

How to avoid survey fatigue

Avoiding survey fatigue is a four-part process:

1. Ask the right questions - ensure that you’re asking questions that make sense and that can be used as a tool to change/improve something in the workplace.?
2. Listen - like, really listen to the answers and take them on board, even if (especially if) they run contrary to what you thought you would hear or what you would have liked to have heard.
3. Act - use the information to enact change for the positive. After all, isn’t that why we ask the questions in the first place?
4. Communicate - every step of the way, make sure your staff know what’s happening, how their answers are being utilised, what’s changing (and what’s not changing) and how it will affect them.

How to bounce back from survey fatigue

If you’re already at a stage where you’ve reached ‘survey fatigue’ then the way out of it is to bite the bullet and acknowledge and apologise for the failings of the past and promise to be better in the future.

Outline the process for how surveys will be administered, listened to, acted on and communicated going forward and involve your staff every step of the way.

If you follow through on what you say you’re going to do, then it’s a fast road out of where you are now to where you want to go.

If you give people more of the same, you can kiss your easily acquired data goodbye.

How often should I administer surveys?

Although the frequency with which organisations will administer surveys will change drastically, the formula is always the same.

Just follow the process in the flowchart and voila, you have your answer!

Surveys are incredibly powerful information gathering tools k if they’re used correctly, so follow the steps, do them right, and you’ll have all the info you could ever need.?

Question: Are your people tired of answering questions or are they tired of getting questions that don’t matter??

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My name is Phil and I'm a workplace wellbeing specialist.

Cool! But what does that mean?

It means I work with organisations to upskill their people so they can be healthy and well under any circumstances...

...whilst also helping the organisation to optimise their circumstances to make it easier for their people to be healthy and well.

If this sounds like something you could use, send me a DM.