The perception of the External publics like customers, suppliers, share holders, media, Government Authorities, etc is very important in projecting the image of the organisation

HOW TO IDENTIFY THE PERCEPTION

Normally the perception is the "mental impression" which every person used to hold to himself for various reasons. Unless this is brought out carefully, real Image of the Organisation cannot be measured. In the Image Audit, a set of questionnaire is prepared and administered to the audience and their feedback is taken anonymously. This would ensure free and fair revelations of their perception.

QUESTIONNAIRE

First the Management should identify the publics (whether employees, customers, suppliers, Media, share holders, etc.) from whom they would like to extract the perception. After identifying the target group, then the Management should finalise the areas where they would like to have the feedback. This is very essential because, the Image Audit would focus on selective areas. For example, if the employees are the target audience, the Management can focus on the handling of grievances, treatment given to them, etc. If the target group is customers, then customer satisfaction, availability of products to them, how the counter staff behaves with them, etc. can be taken for study.

After finalizing the target audience and the issues, then a set of questionnaire has to be developed. The questionnaire should be in two parts. The first part should contain the broad details of the respondent like Gender, Age, Occupation or year of service, etc. This may be decided basing on the project. Care is to be taken that the name, address and other finer identities of the respondent are not obtained.

In the second part, questions for the issues that are required to be analysed should be framed and the respondent may be given an option to choose one of the multiple choices of the answers. For example, if you are interested to know how courteous the counter staff is behaving with the customers, then you can frame the question as follows:

In your perception, how the counter staff behaves with you

Highly courteous Courteous Average Poor No comments The respondent can also be asked to give his perception in the scale 0 to 10, with zero being the worst.

The respondents may also be asked to given their views in an open-ended question (No choice is being given)

TEST ADMINISTRATION

Too many questions in a questionnaire will be irritating for the respondents. As for as possible, the number of questions should be limited to 10 to 15. When the questions are framed, test administer the questionnaire to select 4 or 5 respondents of the same target group. Observe whether they are able to understand well and respond properly. If not, make suitable modifications and corrections.

ADMINISTRATION

The questionnaire should be administered to the targeted audience on a select day on random sampling basis. The sample size may be decided depending on the issue and other factors.

The administration may be done either personally or through post or through e mail. The analyst should also interact with few respondents and try to get the first hand information. This would help him later for finding solutions.

ANALYSIS

The response sheets may be scanned through. Few samples will have extraordinary opinions either excellent for all questions or worst for all questions. Analyse carefully such samples and take a decision to take or leave. All the response sheet may be numbered serially and fed into the computer for analysis. Analysis can be done basing on the requirement of the Management.

PREPARATION OF REPORT

A detailed report may be prepared covering the Methodology, No. of responses received, Break up of responses gender wise, age wise, etc. The report should contain the detailed analysis of the responses received in quantity and in percentage. The report should contain the observations of the analyst combining all the responses. The analyst should also spell out various suggestions for the problems identified through Image Audit.

* K. Srinivasan is the Chairman and Managing Director of Prime Point Public Relations (P) Limited, Chennai. E Mail prpoint@vsnl.com Website www.prpoint.com and www.primepointfoundation.org