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“are you satisfied with the progress of this work?” “what is the reason for your dissatisfaction?” ... many people often receive various satisfaction surveys, some of which are follow-up visits from businesses, and some are evaluations of a certain work of a government department.

however, some satisfaction surveys do not satisfy people. some surveys ask questions that are incomprehensible to people, and people are told to “tick the box whether they understand it or not”; for some surveys on work performance, relevant departments will send text messages to people in advance, or even visit them to remind them, hoping that they will answer “satisfied”.

the public satisfaction survey is a practical measure to understand the public sentiment and collect public opinions. however, some satisfaction surveys that have no practical significance for work improvement and are conducted for the purpose of completing tasks have invisibly added burdens to grassroots cadres and the public. why is this? how can we conduct satisfaction surveys to achieve practical results?

image source: visual china

one

satisfaction survey is a form of investigation and research. it was first used in the commercial service field, and later in the public service field. the party committee and the government pay attention to the people's sense of gain, happiness, and security, and use satisfaction evaluation and other methods to evaluate the effectiveness of the business environment and people's livelihood, so as to better listen to public opinion and promote work.

with the passage of time and the advancement of technology, satisfaction surveys have expanded from questionnaires, telephone surveys, and on-site observations to online surveys, online reviews, message analysis and other methods, with continuous improvements in survey methods, sample extraction, and data analysis.

effective satisfaction surveys help understand the needs and opinions of the masses, provide a basis for improving work, and play a role in reflecting public opinion and testing work effectiveness. however, the development of satisfaction surveys has also exposed some problems.

for example, the question design is unreasonable.some satisfaction surveys do not conduct sufficient research on the work they are investigating and fail to grasp the core issues. the survey questions are either vague and difficult to understand; or they are cumbersome and meander around to get the same idea; in order to get better results, some surveys have inductive question designs to guide the respondents' answers; some surveys even only allow "satisfied" to be selected, and deliberately make the "unsatisfied" option ineffective to achieve a "100% satisfied" result.

for example, the sample lacks representativeness.when conducting surveys and research, sample selection is crucial. whether the sample is targeted and comprehensive largely determines whether the survey results are accurate and credible. some surveys have exposed problems of incompleteness and objectivity in the sampling design. for example, in the satisfaction survey of some rural-related work, there are few or even no samples in remote areas such as mountainous areas and islands; the samples of some activity satisfaction surveys are only selected from activists, lacking multi-dimensional coverage and difficult to reflect the real opinions and situations of the general public.

for example, the investigation process was not standardized.some investigators have not received professional training, are unskilled in their operations, and lack sufficient communication. some individual investigators even have a stiff attitude when communicating with the public. they just read out the questions mechanically and consider the work "finished" after a perfunctory response. some "top-down" satisfaction surveys have resulted in inaccurate survey results because of insufficient channels for the public to ask questions and make complaints. a few places lack supervision and investigation channels in satisfaction surveys, resulting in violations of regulations or "fudge-style surveys."

image source: visual china

two

why do some satisfaction surveys fail to satisfy the public and provide true feedback? i believe there may be at least the following reasons.

survey programming.if you are routine in your work, you will not be able to jump out of the established framework and break the "path dependence". some satisfaction surveys are always carried out at fixed times and in fixed ways, and some survey questions are even "unchanged, the same year after year"; there are also some places that do not "work hard" in normal times, and only conduct surprise surveys when the survey is approaching. the survey process and questions are all copied from the internet, which are full of routine and stereotyped traces. naturally, it is impossible to accurately and effectively reflect the actual situation.

the work is superficial.some satisfaction surveys lack in-depth thinking, diverse investigations, down-to-earth visits, and no closed-loop problem-solving solutions. what's worse, some people think that after conducting satisfaction surveys, the work has formed a closed loop, and they don't care whether the masses are truly satisfied or whether the work they are dissatisfied with has been resolved.

to conduct a satisfactory survey, scientific and systematic design is needed in the whole process including program formulation, sample extraction, personnel training, question setting, data analysis, feedback and improvement. otherwise, it will only be a superficial survey.

utilitarianism of ideas.it is undeniable that in some places, the public satisfaction accounts for a certain proportion in the relevant work assessment, which has also induced some people to have a utilitarian understanding of the satisfaction survey, and even to have a biased perception that "bad survey results will affect political achievements", and to do everything possible to obtain the result of "satisfaction". for example, they let the staff induce answers on the spot, adopt wrong practices such as rewarding satisfaction and coercing satisfaction, and even falsify data.

satisfaction surveys conducted for the sake of superficial satisfaction or satisfaction surveys that are inflated with water not only fail to investigate the actual situation, are unhelpful in solving problems and improving work, but may also become the "emperor's new clothes" that grassroots cadres and the masses "see through but do not speak out."the main reason why people feel that this is formalism is that the initiators of the investigation and the executors of the process have a distorted view of political achievements.

cartoon: squeezing out the "water" in satisfaction source: xinhua news agency wechat official account

three

general secretary xi jinping emphasized: "investigation and research are the basis for planning and the way to achieve success. without investigation, there is no right to speak, and without investigation, there is no right to make decisions." it is not easy to do a good job in satisfaction surveys. the most important thing is to face the masses and the problems directly, and to fully consider the dialectical relationship between visible and potential performance, and long-term and short-term performance. in this regard, the author thinks of three sentences.

satisfaction cannot be used to cover up real problems.rather than a satisfaction survey, it is better to say that it is a survey of dissatisfaction. a satisfaction survey should not be conducted just for the sake of "satisfaction", but should be conducted for the sake of problem investigation and truth investigation. as a working method, it is to discover and solve problems and make policy making more scientific and effective. in short, it is to do a better job of serving the people.

don’t judge a hero by “100% satisfaction”.instead of worrying about how high the satisfaction level is, it is better to pay more attention to how to find out and fill in the gaps in the problems that the masses are dissatisfied with, and spend a lot of effort to write the "second half of the article" of the satisfaction survey so that the masses can see the effectiveness of problem solving. the effectiveness of grassroots work promotion can be measured from the resolution rate of dissatisfied problems and the effectiveness of work promotion, so as to open up a "virtuous cycle" with a "closed work loop".

avoid seeing only data and not people.at present, the evaluation of some grassroots work is just the exchange of data and reports, and has not really gone to the masses to conduct face-to-face understanding and heart-to-heart communication. when comrade mao zedong conducted the xunwu investigation, he went deep into shops, workshops, markets and other scenes, and also went to suburban rural areas to investigate while working with farmers. it took more than 20 days and obtained a lot of high-value first-hand information. the investigation of grassroots work should avoid "office visits" and "closed-eye investigations". go to the grassroots to conduct real investigations, let your feet get more dirty, chat with the people more, see the scene, and find out the truth. only then will the evaluation and feedback received be more valuable for reference.

the sense of gain should be reflected in daily life.the results of satisfaction surveys are certainly important, but they cannot be allowed to occupy a "large proportion" of the assessment of grassroots cadres. grassroots work is complicated. if the "satisfaction survey" is turned into a "satisfaction assessment", grassroots cadres will focus their energy on "all-weather" preparation for the exam and "full coverage" show. this is a burden on the grassroots and the masses. the evaluation of the effectiveness of grassroots work should be normalized and long-term, and not limited to a single moment or event. in addition to satisfaction surveys, irregular visits and surveys, online real-time satisfaction scoring, feedback messages on online platforms, etc. are all reference dimensions for the level of satisfaction. only by taking multiple approaches can we better understand the satisfaction and sense of gain of the masses.

people have their own scales to judge whether they are "really satisfied" or "being satisfied". in the final analysis, "satisfaction" is only true satisfaction if it can stand the test of time and the people.