Free Survey Makers - Where You May Be Going Wrong

Trade-off Area

Free Surveys

Dedicated Survey Provider

Anonymity of respondents

Surveys like Google Forms and MS Forms capture respondents’ details as the default setting - so anonymity is not assured if you do not turn this off.

If you are asking demographic data questions (such as gender) again, identifying the individual becomes not just easy but very likely.

A good provider will separate employee data and survey response data to ensure that anonymity can be assured, this plus restricting charts and data to a minimum number of respondents (say, five.)

Demographic questions will be stored for survey responses and not against the person’s record.

You cannot download a detailed report with survey responses and identifiable data – Online dashboards ensure you have the information you need without the risk of identifying who said what.

Your Organisation GDPR or Data Processing rules

Where is the data stored in the UK, the EU?

Do you know?

Products like Survey Monkey have clauses stating they may transfer your data outside the EU/UK.

Remember, when you use a free tool, you may not be going through your procurement process, your legal team’s due diligence and ensuring that the way that data is held and destroyed is in line with these.

When someone sets up a free survey and leaves the organisation, do you retain control of the data? (the answer is probably not) and can you guarantee it is destroyed or erased in line with your policies?

Do your people know you have put their personal information into a free online tool? (They should do, as they have rights around how their data is stored)

When you procure an Employee Feedback platform, you will probably go through some due diligence to ensure they can fulfil the legal requirements of GDPR and your data processing policies.

You will enter into a contract with clauses and penalties to give clarity to both parties on who is responsible for what and what happens if something goes wrong.

The platform you procure will mean you are fulfilling your obligations and the rights of the individual whose data you are processing.

Your Feedback partner will have, as a minimum, ISO27001 certification so you know that they are audited each year and meet the requirements to handle people’s data.

They will have vulnerability testing and penetration testing as a standard.

Data in the wild

Spreadsheet anarchy is one of my favourite descriptions of what happens when you do not have the right tools.

Google Forms, MS Forms and Free Survey Tools all output to spreadsheets.

(We will talk about analysis in a mo…)

But you now have spreadsheets of potentially personal and identifiable data floating around in your organisation - why?

Because, mostly, the online reporting tools are not good enough to use.

A decent Survey Platform will have everything built in;

• People Data
• Survey Distribution
• Analytics
• Downloadable Reports
• Exports to Excel
• Trend Analysis
• Benchmarking
• User Set-Up and Restrictions

This means you are not downloading sensitive data to work on, and instead use a tool designed to keep data safe and secure, while giving you the insights you need to take action.

How you structure your organisation, people demographics and reporting groups

If you want to drill down into your report and see how different groups feel and break down your reporting to be meaningful, then you will need to know your people's org structure and demographics.

With free tools, this means you will be asking them this as a question, e.g. “What gender do you identify as”

And circling back to point one, by asking this, plus having a spreadsheet of responses, you can now identify individuals.

Either through HR Systems Integrations or through uploads of people data, a survey platform should;

1. Cope with how you segment your data
2. Automatically capture demographic data not in the upload and show these in online dashboards
3. Segment your surveys (send to only a group of people)
4. Segment your dashboards
5. Lock down access so managers only see the charts and reports you want.

All of this plays back into the trust element of surveys; with free tools, the survey creator can identify people – and you have to be ok with this.

Who is doing the heavy lifting

Well, you…

And you may be awesome at this, but it is still your time and effort going into this;

• Writing the questions
• Creating communication material
• Setting up the Survey
• Sending emails
• Sending chaser emails
• Analysing the results
• Creating dashboards or reports
• Presenting the results back
• Fielding any questions
• Supporting managers by creating presentations for them
• And more!

Your survey platform partner has a team of people to support you.

You are not just buying technology but also:

• Client Success
• Help Desk Support
• Organisational Psychology
• Analytics
• Marketing and Communications
• and more!

As the heavy lifting is not sitting on your shoulders, you can focus on the outcomes of the survey, the internal work and on taking action!

HRIS Integrations

Pretty much no integrations.

So, limited or no, automation and you end up with spreadsheets all over the place and your people data is probably self-reported (e.g. Gender, Location, Team)

You should expect some integration if you have a long-term contract with a survey provider with your current HR systems

The limitation is most likely with your HR system and not the survey partner - Modern Survey Platforms have an API that allows them to quickly connect to your HR Systems and your data is kept clean and up to date.

This also allows survey automation, like exit interviews, new joiners surveys and stay interviews based on HR Systems trigger events.

Price

Well, it is free to use - the cost is your time and the quality of the delivery/outputs/outcomes.

Paid for - But saves you time, delivers the quality of service and outputs without you having to do the work.