And to add to what Saurabh has to say, one of my managers (in an earlier company) used to say "it's good to rely on your gut feel but it's even better when the data backs that up".

Thank you for the insight and the personal experience, Doc!

I think there is some food for thought there around constructing questions with little room for ambiguity in response. I would use the likert scale quite confidently for soliciting responses from a smaller group of consumers (read: B2B type environments) but might be a little more careful in allowing a neutral stance in other primary data collection exercises like market surveys for retail - where we might ask the person off the street for views where they may not be current consumers and not very attached to the act of providing viewpoints (especially considering that such exercises usually aim for as large a sample size as possible).

So, in time honored tradition of management responses, I guess the answer to using the right scale is "It depends!"

netneanderthal,

Thanks for reading my pdf! Smiles!! Thanks also for the questions and reasoning's supplied. Ihave used the Likert scales for 35 plus years. Learn more here;




Having responsibility for a corporate college for a number of years there was ample opportunity to use such scales in both course content (feedback from customer) and facilitator style and delivery (feedback from customer).

Having such data in hand allowed me to make adjustments for both the course content and instructor's style of delivery. Later we included "facilities and environment" in these measurements.

I kept only the top instructor's, gave statistical and observation feedback to their immediate supervisor's as a part of their job performance review process -- very helpful in groweing these leaders and gaining recognition and financial reward for them based on this information.

Also held and annual instructor dinner (spouses included) and awarded them for services and outstanding work -- including the "top Gun" form each course and top instructor of the year.

Have used the Likert scale's in many other type's of data gathering processes -- so yes I have many years of experience with same.

You are correct, any participant of such a feedback instrument can ride the fence if they so desire. One way to help off set this is to provide a place for participants to add comment's.

I spend time explaining the process to participants prior to the actual recording of the instrument. I hold this device until near the end of my time with these folks. This allows them to first see, hear, and feel the presentation and then provide comment and feedback.

Typically these classes contained 25 participants, covering perhaps 4 topics per day, all over the course of a week. Lots of data to collect. This for only one curriculum of which we had many different programs. Across the board we likely had 2k people each day of the week on campus -- all year long.

A scale of 5 or 10 produce's similar numbers (normal distributions) hopefully skewed to the higher positive end of the scale. Likert suggests having a (4) point scale if the middle of the road bothers you.

I personally didn't feel this gave me a clear picture of the overall process and felloings of the participants -- somehow I had cheated a few out of their right to call the event they experiences a (neither agree or disagree).

The reality of the middle of the road herd is that they simply present another area of investigation for the project manager of such measurement devices. Would it not raise questions as to why 68% of the responder's found the CTQ (X) to be on the 2end of the scale? Opps -- Houston we have a problem.

Same thing, in a slightly reverse look, is having 95% of the respondants finding the CTQ (X) to be at a 4.5 -- how do we move closer to a 5?

These scales are still "subjective" in nature, based on "I think or I feel". And so? They are provided by the customer you are trying to please. The idea is to investigate and develop your systems, processes and people to move towards excellence in delighting your customer's in all you do.

Over development or exclusion of one to the other(s) will lead to failure. The Likert 5 point scale is widely used and works for most all type's of data gathering from participants and customer's alike. Based on the cummulative total's, you have "opportunity" to investigate and improve upon all you measure.

You need good clear questions -- that should conclude with a single answer. Do not run questions together (and/or) inclusions should be alarms that you need another question.

Try to keep your instrument fairly short. 10 to 15 to the point questions on information needed to measure success or improvement opportunity's should get the job done. It takes good planning to gather and use just ther right questions to gain that which you seek.

Having several groups of 25 people taking the same classes, from among several instructors, during the week gave real insights to our process and delivery. Having this process repeated during the course of a year, even over severl years, allowed us to really refine our processes, delivery's, and instructor skills.

Do let me know if you have additional questions -- happy to share my experiences and knowledge's to assit in growing the leaders around me.

Blessings,
Lakota

Nice share, Doc. There are some pointers in the document that I have not been told before so these came as a real eye-opener to me (for e.g., the ratio of Hows to Whats of 1:1.5).

I have a quick question for you - there are some references to ranking in the "Quantify what is Importance" section. Does it make sense to retain a 1-5 rating? I know that the best answer is that it depends on the company and it's preferred mechanism for measurement; but in my experience, this allows customers to answer in the neutral (with the rating of 3). Whereas with a 1-10 scale, there is absolutely no choice for the customer to be in the neutral and has to take a stance (at the worst rating it a 5 or 6 for the closest to neutral response).

Do you think that this makes more sense to do from a data analysis and "truer" response perspective?

Saurabh,

This is rendered in a flash file format (.swf). You can download a free Adobe Flash player -- here is one place to gain access;

http://get.adobe.com/flashplayer/

Let us know how this works for you.

Blessings,
Lakota

Sir,

the file format is in .swf.... not able to view it. What is the software used to viewing it? OR am I missing something?

Lakota,

Just got around to reading this, and thought I'd let you know that you're not alone as regards the medical profession. As you know, Anne has a progressive illness; she also takes blood thinning agents for a problem called Raynauds. The doctors prescribed some very powerful thinning agents. A routine blood test identified a severe depletion in one of the necessary blood constituents. I did some research and identified that whilst taking these thinning agents, she should avoid garlic in all forms. Nobody had told us, it wasn't listed in the leaflet that came with the pills! We abandoned garlic from all food (not easy, especially when you like it) and a second blood test proved things were almost as expected.

However, things didn't stop there. A very prominent "specialist" prescribed her a drug that was known to cause renal failure, but again, neglected to tell us of this. The drug was also linked to shingles, and when Anne went down with this the doctor was, shall we charitably say, rather embarrassed and stopped her taking the drug! Turns out he was running some sort of private experimental research, and had again neglected to tell us.

The number of tests that have not been carried out properly and had to be redone....the number of results lost. It really beggars belief.

However, the best happened a few weeks ago. Anne attended a routine drug review (ha ha!) with her general practitioner. He wanted to go through a few things on her now computerised records. It turns out, according to these records, that she has high blood pressure. - She doesn't! It also turns out that she has had a hysterectomy. - She hasn't!

The doctor assured us that he would look into things, because these records are now nationally available and would be used had she had an accident away from home; hence he thought it important that they be accurate. Last week she had a letter "inviting" her for tests at the local hospital for her high blood pressure!

At times, I truly despair.

Re: the medical procedures we see our loved ones go through, the old adage of "All's well that ends well" holds true (since the days of Hippocrates).

Re: the avatar, sounds like the Doc is having issues with change management ... It will be back shortly - just a change for some time!

Can't ignore the voice of the customers (nor board moderators) can we?

yogambala,

Thank you my friend for viewing this video and for taking the time to post a reply. Both you and Prabh are very much appreciated for taking the time to post a reply. Thgis is the type of leadership we should all reach for -- modeling the desired behaviors.

Blessings,
Lakota.

Prabh,

Thank you sir for taking the time to review this video. Appreciate as well the fac t you took the time to post a reply.

Blessings,
Lakota

Each word uttered are so powerful and It is really exemplary presentation.
Thanks for sharing

fabulous thanks for sharing

Netneanderthal,

Seems you have the waterfront covered. I would involve senior management in this planning and include your financial rep to crank out a formula and corresponding dollar value. It will be most interesting, and I would venture to guess one meeting and set of deliverable's that gain the attention and sup[port of senior management.

Let me know what takes place.

Blessings,
Lakota

netneanderthal,

Appreciate you, Sena is doing well, Healing process will take about 7 weeks. In 6 months she will have surgery on the other eye.

With this first experience we should be well armed and on high alert for any problems this next time. It sure opened my eye's. How many times to we "blindly" (pardon the pun) trust our medical and pharamacy professionals to do the right things -- most often never thinking to ask questions.

PS
I miss your original avatar -- it never failed to get a smile out of me.

BLessings,
Lakota

Thought provoking, but scary.

Good to know the surgery went off well...

No, I did not have another answer in mind but was just thinking aloud!

I agree that an organization should not take that risk to be in a position to lose a customer in the first place and that by the time they are ready to come back, the product or service would have evolved considerably.

But 20:1 makes me think of assigning a $$$ value to re-claim a customer based on the following criteria:

One is obviously the customer value lost over the lifetime of customer absence - which can be relatively easily be predicted.

The second would be factoring in loss of potential referrals from this customer.

The third would be the cost of business development / marketing required to woo this customer back (a little easier to ascertain in institutional buying).

Is there some other aspect you think I have missed out on?

Netneanderthal,

Lost customer's typically do not return to us once they have taken the steps to move on to a competitor. When and if they do return, it would likely be well after much time has passed and you have gained proven product and service or transaction changes have matured to the point of "strongly meeting or exceeding" their customer critical requirements (needs, expectations, and specifications).

I would venture a guess it would be somewhere in the area of 20:1 -- if at all poissible. That is to say for every 20 new customer's gained you might see the return of a previous customer.

Poiunt is why risk failure to delight your customer's in the firsdt place? Still, many seem to go out of their wasy to create bad experiences for their customers and as a result will often see those customers taske their business elsewhere.

You have another answer in mind?

Blessings,
Lakota

Hard hitting for sure and most often comes to bite companies on the backside for not paying too much attention to this area, if you ask me!

An interesting question - how much do you think it costs to bring an ex-customer back into our fold?

netneanderthal,

Thanks for the additional stats. Hard hitting stuff isn't it?

Thanks for the posting.

Blessings,
Lakota

Some interesting stats as usual, Doc. Here are a couple more to add to mix that I know of:

Customer turnover due to poor customer service = 75%

The organization's perceived turnover number due to poor customer service: 20%

Companies are either not listening enough, or listening right!