Electronic forms and surveys

Collecting and analysing data is a critical step in the improvement cycle. Doing this electronically has the potential of shortening this stage so that we can more rapidly move into the action stages where the actual improvement happens.

There are a range of tools available for this including

• Zoomerang
• Survey Monkey
• JotForm
• Google Docs

I like the idea of Google Docs because it is free and integrated into their overall application service. Google Docs provides an online wordprocessor, spreadsheet, presentation tool, and free storage. JotForm also creates forms in this way but these are not integrated integrated into other applications.

Google Docs
Using Google Docs, online survey forms can be created that allow for a variety of questions types including

• text
• paragraph text
• multiple choice
• checkboxes
• choose from list

You will need a Google login to start creating a form but the people that you want to fill out your form or survey will not.

Once the survey is prepared you enter the recipient email addresses and wait for the results to flow back in.

The results are automatically added to a spreadsheet ready for further analysis.


Video showing how to create a survey form




Written instructions

• Some written and easy to follow instructions can be found here and also here
• For those that are fairly literate then these very simple and brief instructions from Google are great.