Online Program

Thinking Inside the Box: Business Behavior and Its Implications for the Survey Response Process

Keywords: response process, business management, organization, nonresponse

Since the last two ICES conferences, more and more research has been done to better understand the response process in business surveys. This research continues to reveal new insights into factors affecting business decisions and behaviors with respect to survey response. While the various conceptual models resulting from this research focus on different aspects of survey response, their perspectives basically complement one another. Together with knowledge gleaned from literature in the management and administrative sciences, issues emerge pertinent to the design and conduct of business surveys.

In this presentation, we discuss implications of the business context for survey response, drawing out many factors so taken for granted as to go unrecognized as having an impact. In our forthcoming book, these constitute our jumping off point for a high-level framework that explicitly considers business goals and behaviors when designing and conducting business surveys.