Utah Valley University (UVU) needed a standardized way to track employee performance. This new system had to allow school administrators to configure multiple survey types, their frequency, and notifications—and to display and follow up on their previous responses.
Of course, this is all in retrospect. When wide-eyed, innocent me sat at the start of the kickoff meeting, I had no clue I was about to be exposed to a firehose of features.
Let's dive in, shall we?
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DASHING MY Hopes for an EASY SOLUTION
The main dashboard had some pretty big shoes to fill. A user had to track their own survey completions through multiple stages and required a calendar to track survey deadlines. Plus, if the employee was a supervisor, they needed to monitor the surveys of their team. Oh, goody.
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DASHBOARD - MY REVIEWS
First thing to tackle was users seeing their own reviews. Problem one: surveys running simultaneously (each one in different stages of completion). Problem two: different deadlines (optional and non-optional) and stage indicators packed with multiple descriptions—the kind of information dump that loves to overwhelm users.
Thankfully, card systems were made for this. Key info (like deadline and optional/required indicators) goes inside the card header, and we mark action-required surveys with a badge and float that card to the top.
Next come the stage indicators designating where in the process the survey is—with an accordion toggle to only show descriptions when needed. Lastly, the calendar, complete with legend, provides a quick visual reference of survey timelines. My Reviews sorted.
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DASHBOARD - EMPLOYEE REVIEWS
But what if you’re a supervisor? You also need to track your employee survey completion rates. No problem. There’s a card for that.
Since supervisors need to review submissions, we bring back a simplified ‘needs attention’ badge. The stage indicators remain (collapsed by default) and have either an ‘open review’ or ‘view review’ button. Button types depend on whether or not the supervisor’s input is required for that stage.
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SURVEY CONFIGURATION
These ‘stages’ are not just a way to track survey completion progress. They crucially let us reassign that survey to another employee, such as a supervisor. Each stage’s responses are stored separately.
An example: a manager responds to feedback an employee provided in an earlier stage. Those data sets are not only captured in one survey, but we can also track future and past completions as well. This enables administrators, who create these surveys, to track responses over time.
Pretty much a data analyst’s dream scenario.
Above, we see the view admins use to create and configure the various survey stages. All of the aforementioned settings reside here for each stage, and stages can be added or removed as needed.
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SURVEY BUILDER
So let’s see how we build one of these surveys already! We need to support twelve different question types ranging in complexity. From simple ones like text input or Likert scales to complex ones like displays for responses from past surveys
I’ll use tiles to represent the question types. That way, I can utilize icons, labels, and colors to help differentiate them at a glance. Admins need easy access to all questions when building a survey, so in goes a toolbar. The left-hand side is already our nav, so the right side it is.
Once placed, tiles expand to reveal question settings. They share a header style, but everything below varies greatly depending on the question type. So now we just need to figure out what a survey looks like.
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SURVEY the area
We aren’t here to win design awards, we’re here for clarity. Our form uses a clear hierarchy and established patterns. Users can also save without submitting or sending the survey to the next stage. The form navigation on the lower left bar lets users quickly track their survey progress and see untouched, in-progress, and completed sections.
I always find it ironic that the actual form design is often the simplest element of a survey system.
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A lot of what made UVU PM a challenge to design was just how much power it had to put in the admin’s hands. We had to create surveys, use stages to streamline submissions and reviews from multiple users, and do so without any coding—which UVU's HR department loves since complex programming languages aren’t really their thing.