Techniques for Ranking Items on Surveys

Ranking Version 1: Employee Opinion Survey

For an employee opinion survey, you may want to ask participants to rank the importance of various items. For example, What are the important factors which may inhibit the adoption of organizational changes?

Asking participants to rank the items will give you an indication of what they consider to be most imporant. If the list has more than 7 items, you may want to just ask the participants to rank their top three. If enough employees participate in the survey you can then compute the average ranking for each item (see results below).

Which of the following factors do you feel may lead to resistance to change?

Select the top three (3) factors where 1 is the most prevalent, 2 the second most prevalent and 3 the third most prevalent

Ranked Items: The items shown below are sorted by the number of times that item was selected as one of the top 3 choices (the number shown below as column "n"). The width of the bar chart also indicates the relative importance by changing the size based on the number of times selected in the top 3 (column "n").

Ranking Version 1: Sample Result Format

The table below shows the ranked responses in a graphic form where the percentage of each kind of response is shown using a color from dark blue (Ranked as Most Important) to light blue (Ranked as 3rd most Important).

Other Common Ranked Items in Employee Opinion Surveys

Please rank the following facets of our business that you feel we need to focus on improving most (1 High - 10 Low):

		Investment Performance
		New Products
		Client Service
		New Business (Sales)
		Geographic Presence/Expertise
		IT Infrastructure - Application Development
		IT Infrastructure - Helpdesk Support
		Marketing & Brand
		Line Management Leadership Capability
		Other

Please rank the following facets of your employment package in terms of importance to you (1 High - 7 Low):

		Guaranteed Salary
		Annual Bonus
		Deferred Bonuses (if applicable)
		Pension
		Health Insurance
		Vacation
		Fringe Benefits

Please rank the following facets of your employment offering in terms of importance to you (1 High - 5 Low):

		Cash Income
		Career Development
		Working Environment/Conditions
		Job Security
		Good relationship with your immediate manager

Please check your top three actual sources of information.
the Web
Television
Newspaper
Radio
Magazine
Gossip

Ranking Version 2: 360-Degree Feedback

Try selecting the same competency as a strength and an opportunity. Try selecting more than three. see what happens.

This is an example of how a ranked item can be included on a 360-Degree Feedback assessment form. Please note that the individual is asked to rank three competencies as strengths and three as opportunities for development. The individual cannot select more than three strengths or three opportunities for development. In addition, the individual cannot the same competency as both a strength and an opportunity for development. The validation of their response at the time it is entered helps ensure consistency in the data collection and analysis.

Strengths

Please select up to three (3) attributes that you identify as strengths. (Note these do not need to correspond with your ratings above)

The results from this kind of analysis can be shown in the form of a simple list of competencies and the frequency with which they were selected by the feedback givers.

Example of a simple listing of the results of the ranked item: Opportunities for Development

Participants were asked to select up to 3 competencies that they viewed as areas for your development. The results of this item are shown below. The number next to the competency indicates the frequency with which that competency was selected as one of your areas for development.

Competency	Count
	4
	4
	3
	2
	2
	2
	1
	1
	1
	1

Other Ranking Examples

Click here to view other ranking examples.