Who Let the Dogs Out!

In this article I want to take you on an exploration of a technique I have used for about 12 years for collecting and managing data during organizational assessments. Although pronounced "Dogs", it really stands for Data Information and Analysis Gathering Sheet or DIAGS Sheet. Since assessments are a staple for any business and can be useful for conducting research, I thought it would be good to show how a simple form changed the way an organization did business and was able to transform data into actions.

I once attended a conference for small businesses. Their purpose was to show its attendees how to take a business through the rigors of doing an internal audit. It was a great conference with lots of materials and proven concepts. After a few weeks I starting applying the concepts, techniques and approaches I had learned in the conference in my organization. I remember one of them was to interview personnel about their jobs, environment and a number of other aspects of the mission they were performing to compile a report.

After about three weeks of interviews I looked over my notes and was amazed at what I found. I was taught early on how to keep notes, record key phrases and focus on what is important when collecting data and information. Well, I had notes on everything but it was a complete pile of words. Although in the beginning I tried to logically align subjects, words and phrases then try to match them with offices, people and jobs, it quickly became obvious that I would be spending way too much time with one interviewee. The project was on a timeline and it was evident we were not going to make it at this current rate of data collection.

The data entry people felt that it was wasting many man hours of precious company time using the current method of data collection. The report writing team then requested a different method of data and information collecting from the leadership. I came up with a form that allowed us to quickly record important information about an interview and keep it organized.

Pre-work is the key because most questions and key focus areas in any assessment should be pre-approved by leadership and communicated to all employees. I soon developed the "DOG Sheet" or "Data Information Analysis and Gathering Sheet" (DIAGS).

The DIAGS or "DOG Sheet" was introduced in the middle of the assessment with the premise that we were ready to try anything. We were not able to carry laptop computers everywhere so we used this form. On the first day, it was an instant success. We turned the sheets in to the report writing team at the end of each day and they would transfer it to and electronic version of the form. On day two we would have the forms ready in print to take with us. This proved that we could cut out well over half the time it took to think how to write something down, write it down, keep it in a neat order, and make it legible for report transcribers -- not to mention going back to the report writers to explain where the missing pieces were.

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