"While surveys can reveal how people feel, interviews and focus groups reveal why they feel that way."

Success Profiles utilizes both focus groups and interviews as an additional way to elicit stakeholder feedback.  These tools offer in-depth, detailed information that a survey alone cannot provide. The process of asking for feedback can often times be more important than the information received.

 Interviews are an essential component of the feedback process. They allow for "interactive" probing questions that get to the core issues facing stakeholders. In many cases, the feedback collected from interviews is the most effective and useful for the organization.

Using stakeholder interviews for feedback:

• Are vital to understanding the high priority issues to be addressed within an organization
• Guide organizational change efforts and allow people to feel that their input contributes to change and improvement
• Insure the success of large-scale change efforts

Focus groups are also an effective method to reveal the issues and concerns that are most important to stakeholders.  Benefits of focus groups include:

• Promoting positive feelings that the stakeholders have an active role in organizational decision making
• Gives participants an opportunity to discuss specific issues and to convey their experiences and perceptions
• Allows interaction within the group, which often brings out passionate, detailed feedback