Designing and Conducting Surveys of Businesses and Organizations

 
This course provides an overview of data collection methodology for using surveys to collect data from businesses and organizations. Emphasizing organizational behaviors and attributes that affect survey response, we will demonstrate an approach to survey design that considers the organizational context when developing and implementing survey questionnaires and data collection procedures. This course will include topics related to survey planning, questionnaire design and pretesting, data collection modes, and communication and response improvement strategies. We will consider practical issues that are somewhat unique to the organizational setting, such as who decides whether to participate in the survey, who is the “right” respondent, are the desired data in records, are the data accessible, and so on.

This course will not dwell on design and procedures for surveys that collect information from individual persons, except for highlighting key differences that impact business survey design. This course will not cover statistical procedures associated with business/organizational surveys, such as sampling, data analysis, nonresponse adjustments, or other methodologies for creating statistical summaries.

Who should attend: This course is directed towards students and individuals interested in, or who have responsibility for, obtaining information from businesses/organizations that is organizational or business-related in nature. This includes data that are typically based on or may be extracted from records, such as financial or production data, management practices, or non-identifying information about people associated with the organization.

The instructors draw upon recent business/organizational survey research literature, and practices in their respective organizations, along with material from the 2013 Wiley textbook, Designing and Conducting Business Surveys, by Ger Snijkers, Gustav Haraldsen, Jacqui Jones, and Diane K. Willimack.

Instructors: Diane K. Willimack, U.S. Census Bureau, and Chris Ellis, RTI International

This course will count as 7.0 CSS short course credit hours.
 
 

Please Note: This class has been cancelled. All those who previously registered will be refunded.