Agile QuickTip: Get rid of the ‘Survey 7’ Level-Up to Get Feedback

Get rid of the ‘Survey 7’ to Level-Up the Way You Get Feedback

Surveys can be a really effective tool when collecting feedback or gaining insights from different stakeholders.  Their versatility allows them to be used to get feedback from users and customers as well as to get ideas for improvements from team members.  Surveys can also be really effective as part of a team’s Sprint Reviews and Retrospectives as a tool to gather and visualize different opinions in the same meeting.

I have found that on surveys with questions rating responses from 1 to 10, the number ‘7’ is often the average response.  The ‘7’ becomes the fence-straddler of survey responses: “not terrible, but not good enough to be an ‘8’”.  The ‘Survey 7’ is effectively the non-choice for those that are unsure.  It might make it unclear or difficult to determine what action to take or decision to make.

One technique that might really help is to eliminate the ‘7’ as an option in the survey.  By getting rid of the ‘Survey 7’, it forces respondents to make a choice between the ‘6’ or the ‘8’.  Is it good enough to be rated an ‘8’ or is it just a ‘6’?  By making people choose, we can get better feedback, better insights, and information that is far more actionable.

This Agile QuickTip explains how eliminating ‘Survey Seven’ might have a really positive impact on your team, as well as your product overall.

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