11th April 2007

Quantify's unique presentation of employee survey results helps prevent a waste of resources

The results of an Employee Satisfaction Survey can reveal important differences of opinion between different departments, locations, grades, age groups and so on within an organisation. Employers need to look for differences to identify areas for initiatives to address these issues and improve corporate performance.

"But what if the difference is only sampling variation?" asked David Lusty, principal consultant of the organisational research specialist, Quantify.

"Management should only act when a difference is statistically significant," said Lusty, who has some 17 years experience in devising and conducting organisation surveys - and more years as a user of their results.

This has prompted Lusty, through Quantify, to announce a new version of its subset tabulation report. This is the report which results from an Employee Satisfaction Survey and provides the key information that employers need.

"Presenting survey results in a table with a column for each department and so on is a long-established way of showing up differences of opinion," Lusty explained.

"The Quantify report goes one step further by flagging - in a matrix below each row in the report - which differences are significant. That makes it easy for the managerial eye to see which issues should be considered as possible drivers for change initiatives, and which should not.

"We know that clients don't want to be blinded with lots of statistical mumbo-jumbo," he added, "but it is important that we should not encourage them to invest in trying to improve an apparent problem which, in reality, is merely the product of the sampling process that every survey involves. Our new tabulation report provides significance markers for individual questions and for cluster averages - where several questions are aggregated into an overall metric for one aspect or another of people's experience at work."

Quantify believes that this approach will help to prevent managerial misunderstandings about organisation surveys and so avoid any waste of an organisation's resources in addressing issues that have no significant bearing on achieving organisational goals.

end

Notes for Editors

About Quantify! Ltd

Operating an organisation successfully requires accurate, current and comprehensive management information on all the things that influence the success of the organisation - including how it feels to do business with it or be employed in it.

Quantify discovers this information through employee and customer satisfaction research, web-based or on paper, either in a standard or custom built format. Its services include:

• Employee satisfaction surveys

• Customer satisfaction surveys

• 360 degree feedback

• Internal customer satisfaction surveys

• Course assessments

• Leaver survey

• Quantify projects are designed and reported to provide clients with useful, accessible management information which can drive improvement, rather than just being 'nice to know'.

Quantify's founder and principal consultant, David Lusty MCIPD MMS(Dip) MIMC CMC, worked in local authorities for 11 years, in management services and latterly in personnel management. He joined Avis Rent a Car Ltd in 1978, and stayed 12 years, 10 as head of the UK personnel department. He was Director of Personnel and Management Services when he left Avis in 1990 and founded Quantify.

Governed by the codes of professional conduct of the Institute of Management Consultancy and the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, Quantify operates to the highest ethical and professional standards.

Further information from:

David Lusty, Quantify! Ltd: 020 8876 8680 / 07956 518070
Bob Little, Bob Little Press & PR: 01727 860405 / 07850 508209