There are a few guidelines to optimize your use of language when formulating a question.
Keep it short
There are various tips & tricks to get the maximum out of a questionnaire with a Poll scale. Consultants tend to be complete in their questioning, which often borders on wordiness. The PRAIORITIZE team favors questions that are as concise and short as possible. The less ‘ink’ a respondent sees, the lighter the pages look and the subjects feel. Respondents are usually not willing to spend a lot of time answering the questionnaire, so Partners better be wordsmithing something crisp and clear: think advertising one-liners. In the example below: respondents know where business cases are for. So, the question is short, with as much normal ‘street language’ and as little jargon as possible.
Keep it objective
What I think is ‘fantastic,’ you might rate ‘mediocre.’ Adverbs and adjectives are poison for an objective multiple-choice question. If you abstain from these two, interpreting the assessment outcomes becomes easy. And it eliminates discussions about emotions and neutralizes blamestorming. Look at this example from a team effectiveness assessment:
Keep it verifiable
Short sentences that do not contain adjectives and adverbs are a considerable step forward compared to Likert. To top it off, users should make the multiple-choice answers verifiable. Look at these examples:
The ‘Do’-example is clearly verifiable. The ‘Don't’-example isn't. Words like ‘formally,’ ‘regularly,’ ‘periodically,’ ‘documented,’ and ‘described’ make response verifiable. Here are some other examples of verifiable Questions and answers:
