Oracle Fusion Applications Workforce Development Implementation Guide

You can create questionnaires to add to gather feedback from respondents using question and responses you configure.

Capturing Information from Respondents

You can create questionnaires to gather information from, and about, employees in applications that are set up to accommodate questionnaires. For example, you can use questionnaires to collect participant feedback in a performance evaluation, or rate worker potential in an assessment for a talent review.

Using Templates to Maintain Consistency and Configuring for Specific Audiences

You must create templates to use as the basis for questionnaires. With templates, you can maintain consistency for questionnaires, and configure them for:

Note

Questionnaires used for talent reviews, called potential assessments, are predefined and do not require a template.

Specifying the Questionnaire Presentation

You control how the questionnaire appears in the subscriber application. Specify whether the questionnaire appears on one page or across multiple pages, for example. You can add sections to separate questions by type or other classification and specify which questions are required to be answered.

Configuring Questions and Responses in the Question Library

You configure questions and responses in the question library to add to the questionnaire. You can create four types of questions: text field, single select choice, multiple select choice, and no response. For each question type you also configure specific responses, and select the presentation method to determine how the response appears. For example, for the single select question type, you can specify either that the possible responses appear in a single select choice list or as radio buttons.

Controlling Access

Set privacy options to control access to the questionnaire or template. You can permit either anyone with access to a questionnaire or template to edit it, or only the specified owner.

Creating a Questionnaire: Points to Consider

To create a questionnaire, you must first create the template. You can edit the configuration settings in the questionnaire that were inherited from the template.

When you conclude setting up the questionnaire or template, use the Preview button on the Review page to view and confirm the configuration.

Determining the Intended Audience for the Questionnaire

You set up questionnaires to apply for particular subscriber applications, and you can target a general and widespread population, or specific audiences. For example, you can create questionnaires for:

Formatting Basic Information

Specify the basic information for the questionnaire template or questionnaire, to make searching and categorization easier and control access.

ID and Folder

An ID containing only numbers is generated automatically for each questionnaire template and questionnaire. However, you can change it to any unique combination of numbers or characters you need to make it easier to search for or identify. You must also provide a name for the questionnaire or template.

Select the folder in which to store the questionnaires (not available for templates). You can create the folders to categorize questionnaires and to enhance searching for them.

Owner Name

To control access to the questionnaire or template, select the name of an owner whom you want to have access, and set the Privacy setting to Private. Only the owner can then edit the questionnaire or template. If you set the Privacy setting to Public, anyone with permission to access the questionnaire or template can edit it.

Subscriber

In the template, select the application that will use the questionnaire. For example, to add a questionnaire to performance documents, select Performance 360. The template can be used only for the subscriber you select.

Instruction Text and Attachments

Instruction text appears at the top of the first page of the questionnaire. You can add additional introductory text for each section you create. You can also add to a section a No Response question type that contains instruction text, and requires no response.

You can add file or URL attachments to a questionnaire. The attachment appears as a link at the top of the questionnaire, and below the instruction text if it is present.

Adding and Formatting Content

You control how the various sections in the template appear by specifying sequence, appearance, and formatting for questions and responses.

Questionnaire Content: Explained

You specify the content that is contained in a questionnaire and how to display it.

Specifying Section Order and Presentation

If you add multiple sections to the questionnaire, then you can specify the section order as Sequential so that the sections appear in the order you specify, or Random so that the order changes whenever the questionnaire is accessed.

This table lists how each section presentation selection affects a questionnaire.

Specifying Question and Response Order

Section Presentation	Effect
No sections	One required section appears that contains all questions.
Stack regions	Sections are arranged from top to bottom.

Select Vertical for the question and response order in the template to maintain the order you specify in the actual questionnaire. When you select Random, the order for the questions or responses changes whenever the questionnaire is accessed. This prevents respondents from using an answer key for the questions or responses. Responses can vary only for single and multiple choice question types.

For the template, you can also specify whether to allow changes to formatting options, sections, or questions and responses. If you select the check box for any of these, that aspect of a questionnaire created from the template can be edited.

Specifying Response Types

In the template, you select the response types that can appear in questionnaires created from the template. Only questions of the types associated with the response types you select are eligible to appear in the questionnaire.

For example, if you select options for multiple choice selection, such as Check multiple choices and Multiple choices from list, but do not select any for single select choices, such as Single choice from list or Radio button list, you can add multiple choice questions, but not single choice, to the questionnaire. If, however, you select Check multiple choices and Single choice from list, but not Multiple choices from list or Radio button list, you can add both multiple choice and single choice questions, but are restricted to the selected response types for each question type.

Adding and Formatting Sections

Add sections, and then add questions to the sections. At least one section is required for a questionnaire. You can use sections to group questions by type, category, or any other classification.

Select Additional Questions to create a section that will include only questions added in the subscriber application by people with the roles that have permission to edit questionnaires. For performance documents, for example, that could be managers or workers. For talent reviews, a human resource (HR) specialist who is a meeting facilitator has that role.

Select Vertical to display the questions within the section vertically in the order you specify, or Random to change the order whenever the questionnaire is accessed.

You also specify whether the questions in the section are required so that respondents must answer them.

Note

The requirement to answer all required questions is also determined by the subscriber application.

When you select New Page, the section appears on a separate page than the other sections. When the number of questions on a page or section exceeds the setting you specified in the Maximum Number of Questions per Page field, the questions that exceed the specified number appear on the next page. If you enter 6 as the maximum number, for example, but the section contains 10 questions, the section continues on a new page.

Adding, Creating, and Formatting Questions and Responses

You can add questions to the section from the question library, or create new questions. You can add or remove questions, and drag and drop them to the desired order in the section. The order is maintained in the questionnaire if the question order is set to Vertical for the section. If you create a new question, you specify the folder to store the question. Questions stored in question folders will be available to use in other questionnaires.

If you create new questions, you also configure the responses. Questions you add from the question library already have existing responses. However, you can change the response presentation. For example, if the question is a single select type associated with a single choice from list response type, you can change the response type to radio buttons. You can add questions of any type to a section. If the section is not set to required, then you can specify which individual questions are required to be answered in the questionnaire by respondents.

Questionnaire Question and Response Types: Explained

You can create questions from any of four question types to add to the question library, and ultimately, to questionnaires. Along with the questions, you also specify the responses and how the responses are presented in the questionnaire. You can specify whether to allow respondents to add attachments to the response.

Text

For the text question type, a respondent enters a response in a text field. Answers can be any text, such as single words or sentences, or characters. You specify a maximum number of characters the response can contain, and you can optionally specify a minimum number the respondent must enter.

For the response text field, you specify to utilize either plain text, or rich text, to let respondents format their responses using bold, underline, and other characteristics.

Single Choice

With the single choice question type, you create a question and respondents select one response from a list you provide. You select whether to display the responses as either a single select choice list, or radio buttons.

Respondents can select from either responses that you create, or from a rating model. When you associate a rating model with the response type, the possible responses are drawn automatically from the values of the rating model. For example, if the rating model contains five rating levels, the short description and the name associated with the level for all levels, are added directly as responses from which the respondent can choose.

Multiple Choice

Use the multiple choice question type to create a question and permit respondents to provide one or more answers. Create the responses and specify whether the responses are presented as check boxes or a choice list. You can optionally set both a minimum and maximum number of required responses.

No Response

Use the no response question type to add a question with no accompanying responses. You can use it to add additional instructions or information in the section, or let respondents add attachments as a response.

Using Questionnaires in Performance Documents: Explained

You can create questionnaires to add to performance documents to gather feedback from participants, other than direct managers, who have been requested to provide feedback about workers. Managers can use the feedback to help them evaluate workers.

Capturing Feedback in Performance Documents

Using questionnaires allows your organization to get feedback from multiple sources to provide a more rounded evaluation and view of a worker's performance. You can use questionnaires to capture feedback from the worker being evaluated, the worker's manager, peers, colleagues, other managers, internal customers, or any other role in the organization. Participant feedback captured in a performance document cannot be used to rate workers in the performance document, but managers can use it to help determine how to rate workers.

Respondents access questionnaires in the performance documents. Managers, workers, or both, manage participant feedback to select participants, and assign them roles to determine which questionnaires they respond to.

Collecting Information on a Worker Other than Competencies and Goals

You can use questionnaires to gather data about workers that is not specifically about competencies and goals, thus extending the range of information concerning the worker's performance and development.

Configuring Questions for Specific Audiences and Periods

You can configure questionnaires to target general audiences, or specific groups, such as managers, workers, peers or other roles. You must associate questionnaires with performance template periods, and assign the roles that respond to the questionnaire. This enables you to create questionnaires that concentrate on specific periods, or can be used over multiple periods.

Performance Documents and Questionnaires: How They Work Together

You can add questionnaires to performance documents to enable participants to provide feedback during a performance evaluation. To add questionnaires to performance documents, you must first create questionnaire templates and questionnaires, and configure the elements that make up a performance template to include questionnaires.

This figure illustrates the steps required to add questionnaires to performance documents and track feedback.

Create Questionnaire Template

You must create a questionnaire template from which to create a questionnaire and assign Performance 360 as a subscriber application to make it available in performance documents. In the template, you can format the layout and questions to include in the questionnaires made from it. You can create as many questionnaire templates as necessary for your business process.

Questionnaire

Create the questionnaire from an available template. You can create as many questionnaires as required for your business process. For example, if your organization requires feedback from multiple roles, such as other managers, peers, or internal customers, you may need a different questionnaire for each role. You may also require different questionnaires for each performance evaluation period, or that cover all periods. You can edit questionnaires created from the template as required.

Roles

You must create all the roles that will access questionnaires in a performance document, with the exception of manager and worker, which are default roles. Roles are associated with the questionnaire in the performance template to make them available to the role. Managers, workers, or both, select the roles that apply to each participant when managing participant feedback to determine which questionnaire a participant uses.

Process Flow

To make participant feedback available in a performance document, you must create a process flow that includes the Manage Participant Feedback task. You can specify whether managers, workers or both, can manage and track participant feedback.

Section

Create a Questionnaire section to include in the performance document. The Questionnaire section is the only section type that can contain questionnaires. The questionnaire appears as a tab in the performance document, as do other sections, such as Goals or Overall Summary. You must add all the roles that will access the questionnaire to the section.

Performance Template

In the performance template you add the roles, process flow, and Questionnaire section that you created for the questionnaire. To the document periods you add the roles that you want to be able to access the questionnaire, and specify the questionnaire to associate with each role. Managers and workers can also be requested to answer questionnaires. To do so, you must add them to the document period.

In the template, you can also specify the minimum number of participants required to answer the questionnaire for each role, and a total minimum number of participants for each document. These settings are used as guidelines and are not enforced.

Performance Document and Participant Feedback

After the manager, worker, or human resource specialist creates the performance document the manager, worker, or both, can select participants, send requests for feedback, and manage the feedback. Depending on the settings in the questionnaire, managers or workers can add additional questions to the questionnaire. The ability to manage participant feedback is determined by the process flow settings.

Participants, other than workers and managers, can access the Questionnaire section of the performance document. They can also add provide comments that appear in the Overall Summary section, if the performance template is configured to allow them to do so, that managers and workers can view. Workers and managers can access the Questionnaire section to view participant feedback, if the process flow is configured to allow them to do so.

When the manager submits the performance document, the participant feedback is locked and participants cannot add or edit feedback. Any feedback they saved before the document is locked is retained. If the questionnaire contains sections or questions that are required, the feedback that is complete is accepted. If a section is required, and includes five required questions, for example, and a participant answers four of the questions, the feedback is recorded for those that are answered, in spite of the section being incomplete. The incomplete questions are ignored.

FAQs for Define Questionnaires

What happens if I edit a questionnaire that is in use?

You are prompted to either create a new version of the questionnaire, or update the existing questionnaire. When you create a new version of the questionnaire you can configure it as you would any newly-created questionnaire. When you update an existing questionnaire, the new version replaces the older one. Respondents will access the latest version wherever it appears.

If no one has submitted a response to the questionnaire yet, you can add new sections and questions, and specify those that are required. If at least one respondent has submitted a response, you can add new sections and questions, but you cannot specify that either are required.

22 Define Questionnaires

Questionnaires: Explained