Create and schedule questions

Step-by-step how to copy a pulse

1. Go to Questions > Pulse Library

Click on the pulse you want to copy and then click the "Save as a copy" button in the lower section of the pulse settings. This will copy all current pulse settings (pulse and question translations, access, tags etc). 

2. Choose whether you want to keep the original questions or add the questions as copied versions

By default, the original questions will be added to the pulse copy so you can continue to see internal/external benchmarks. The questions will then remain locked for changes, but you will be able to make changes such as removing and adding questions to the copied pulse.

If, however, you want to be able to make changes to the questions themselves, you choose to add the questions as copies by ticking the box "Add questions as copy".
New editable versions of the questions are then created and editing of the questions will be enabled.  

Note! If you choose to add the individual questions as copies, you will lose existing benchmarks.

3. The pulse copy is created
When you see that the copying was successful, you can find the copied pulse under "My pulses / shared with me". We recommend that you change the pulse name or image after copying the pulse so that it is easily distinguishable from the original pulse.

A pulse is a set of questions and can cover any area that you like - from stocking up the company fridge to stress levels. To create your own question pulse in &frankly, go to Questions > Pulse library. 

1. Start with a pulse name and a description. By explaining the purpose of the pulse in the description, the users will probably understand the importance of the pulse and feel motivated to answer. The description of the pulse is visible next to the questions, have a look at this article for further details: How to communicate the purpose of the pulse

If you want the name and description in more than one language, simply change the language in the menu to the right of the pulse editor and add text. Note that you have to have text in the default mode of the menu (language/språk) to be able to save the pulse. Have a look at the bottom of this article for a further explanation of this. 

2. Add questions to the pulse either by creating your own or by adding questions from our library. A pulse can contain around 30 questions, but our recommendation is to have five to eight questions per pulse. For instructions on how to create your own questions, you will find a guide here. 

3. Share the pulse to a colleague or to the Company pulses. Administrators can see all pulses created in an account, but managers can only see and use the ones that they have created themselves or that is shared with them.

You can share the pulse either by making someone the owner of the pulse or by sharing it. Being an owner of the pulse means that you have full access to see, edit and schedule. Sharing a pulse means that someone else will be able to see and schedule (but not edit) the pulse to their team. If you want all managers to have access to the pulse, add it to the "Company pulses" in your account. 

4. Save the pulse and when you are ready to schedule it, go to Schedule > Scheduling. 

Here is a guide on how to schedule the pulse. 

Why is "default mode" for the pulse description mandatory? 

When you create your own pulse you need to write the text in default language mode. 

If you don't add text in the default mode, the system won't know which text/translation to show users that selected a language that you haven't translated the pulse description to. 

For instance, say that you have an organization where multiple languages are used and you create a pulse including descriptions in Swedish, Finnish, and English. If you have a user that has the setting to get questions in Norwegian, the system would not know what language to display. That's why you always need to add text in the default version.

We recommend you to write English in the default mode if that is the official language in your organization.  

Read more about translations here: What translation will be seen by the users?

1. Go to Questions > Pulse Library. Click on the button “Create new pulse”.
If you would like to learn more about how to add name, description and settings in the pulse, read this guide: Create your own pulse in &frankly.

2. Click on “Create New Question”: 

3. Here is where you will find the different Templates for different types of questions.
The different questions types in &frankly represent well-established models such as multiple-choice, single-choice, scale questions, and more.

They all have their unique benefits and for inspiration, we recommend that you start by having a look in the question library to see examples of how they are used.

4. If you have selected a template, you can go to Content. In this section, you will add the standard version of the question and any statements or options. 

If you want to learn more about how to ask a good question, read this guide: Asking Questions Do's   and Don'ts. The most important thing is to think about how to use the result and formulate a strong purpose for each question.

5. In the Alerts section you can activate Alerts and add criterias to make sure that any deviating answers or alarming results are flagged. Alerts is a function that helps you detect outlying results based on certain conditions.

When an alert has been triggered, it will appear in the Dashboard. For more instructions, please read this guide about how to configure Alerts to a question.

6. Under the Tags section, you have the opportunity to tag your question. By tagging your questions,  you can easily find the questions if you also added them to the company library.

If you tag the questions with any of the seven drives from our Engagement framework, managers and employees will also receive tips on Actions in relation to the result.

7. The next section is Languages and here you can add translations to the question to give respondents the possibility to answer in a language they feel comfortable with.

We recommend you let a colleague review your translations as subtle nuances in languages can make a big difference in how a question or statement is perceived. For more instructions, please read this guide: How to add translations to your questions

8. Last but not least, choose which Color you want to use in your question. We've chosen colors that work well in our interface with regards to readability, contrast, etc. 

Questions that exist in our standard library are locked and can't be adjusted. If you find a question that you like, but feel that you would like to make smaller adjustments to it, you can copy the question. This will create a new and editable version of the question.

Note: when you copy a question a new question ID will be generated, which enables editing of the question.

How to copy a question:  
Only questions that exist in the library can be copied. Everyone that is allowed to create pulses (administrators and managers) can see and copy questions from the library to a new pulse. Only administrators can add questions to the company library. 

1. Go to Questions > Pulses and create a new pulse.
2. Click "Choose from library" in the pulse editor and when you find the question that you would like to make a copy of, simply click on the three dots down to the right and "Add as copy". The question will be added as a new and editable version.
3. Hold your pointer over the question in the pulse and click on the cogwheel to edit it. 

Keep in mind that all &frankly standard questions have translations. Remember to adjust the translations accordingly to your changes in the default version of the question. 

Questions and pulses that you have created yourself and that have been scheduled are locked. We recommend you create a new pulse if you need to make adjustments to the questions. 

Related articles: 

Add questions to your company library

Why are the questions and pulses locked?

When you create your own questions, you can configure Alerts and set the conditions you prefer. Alerts can be configured for the majority of the question templates: 

1. Start by picking one of the templates that are supported by Alerts: 
2. Then go to the section “Alerts” to configure the threshold. 
3. Click on the toggle “Enable Alerts” 
4. Set the condition that you want to use.
5. Make sure to also add an Alert message to help managers handle results with Alerts. 

Don’t forget to go to the section “Languages” and add translations to the question and the alert message.


When you schedule the pulse, you have to activate the Alerts visibility to make sure the Alerts are active and will be triggered.  

All &frankly standard scale questions and templates have a scale between 0-100. If you want to use a different scale, for example, 0-10 or 0-5, you can accomplish this by creating your own questions and add Increments to them. 

Step-by-step:

1. Create a new question
2. Go to “Content”
3. Enable “Increments”
4. Choose the scale you want to use

When answering a question with increments, employees will see the exact value of the question when they submit their answer.

Yes! If you have created a question and changed the standard scale (0-100) to increments (eg. 0-10), you can configure Alerts with a matching threshold.

Start by adding increments to your question, then go to Alerts and configure the conditions based on this. 

What is a dynamic question? 

At &frankly we know how important relevancy is to drive engagement. The more personal and relevant the &frankly experience, the better the response rate. We try to make &frankly fit everyone’s unique needs.

A dynamic question allows the question to collect specific information from the system and display it for each user. For instance, ask a question about the team and name the team in the question to make it personalized. 

How is this created in the tool? 

Note: this function is only available if you have installed Attributes.

To enable dynamic questions, you have to have attributes added to each user. An attribute can, for example, be "Team", "Closest manager", "Location" or even your company name. 

A dynamic question is created by using curly brackets and the attribute name.

{{Attribute name}}

The system will then recognize which attribute each user has and display the right word. 

Example: 

If you want the users to see the name of their closest manager in the question, you can add Closest manager as an attribute and then add the correct name on each user. The name that you added as the Closest manager will be displayed in the question. 

{{Closest manager}}

If you want to use your account name (which is usually also your company name) you can use {{company}}. The account name will then be displayed in the question.

Note! The results will always display the curly brackets and attribute name since users within the same group can have different attributes. 

&frankly questions and pulses
If you are using the standard pulses or questions in &frankly, they can not be changed or edited in any way. But you can create a new pulse (perhaps with your own questions), which allows you to measure just what you need and schedule exactly the questions you like. 

Your questions and pulses
When a package has been scheduled it will be locked for changes. The reason for this is that if you would edit a question in a pulse, the answers to that question would be mispresented in the results after the change.

Let's say that you ask "At work, my opinion seems to count" and decide to change it to "I am very satisfied with my manager". The answers stored for this question will no longer be valid. This means you lose all your collected data on this question.

If you really need to edit a question or change questions in a pulse, the easiest way is to create a new one. To make this process a little bit faster, you can add the questions you want to keep or move the new pulse to your company library, and then easily select them. Please note that only administrators can add questions to the company library. 

You can also delete/add questions in a pulse, but it would require us to open up this setting. It is important to keep in mind that if a question is deleted from a pulse, the historical results for this question will disappear. 

Can I edit anything in my own pulse? 

Yes, you are allowed to:

• Edit the pulse name and description 
• The pulse accessibility 

What if I really need to edit something anyway? 
If you need to make some adjustments to the questions, the best way to do this is to create a new pulse with the same or new questions. 

To make this a little bit easier, you can add all the questions from the old pulse to your company library. This will help you find the questions easier and also make it possible to copy the question. This will create a new question with a new ID, but that looks exactly the same as the old one plus it will be editable. 

Please keep in mind that when creating a new pulse or copying a question, the results from the two different pulses or the two different questions will not automatically be presented next to each other on the results page. However, you can still compare the questions by selecting two or several pulses.

Add questions to the company library:

Copy questions from the company library: 

If you are working on a pulse but have not scheduled it yet, then you simply need to hit "Remove" from the pulse editing view in order to delete it. 

For pulses that have been on the schedule before and become locked, it is not possible to delete them from your end anymore because deleting it, would also delete the historical results associated with it. If those results were an internal test of the tool, or simply not relevant anymore, then we can help you remove them through our support team, just send us an email to help@andfrankly.com.  

We can also help you remove the results while keeping the pulse, but we cannot remove the pulse and keep the results. 

​​

A. Here you set what the employees can see within their own team.

Example of visibility for direct group members:

​

B. Here you set what the managers can see for the groups they own or have reading rights to.

Example of visibility for group owners:

​

C. Here you set whether the employees should be able to see an overall result for one or more parent groups to which their own team belongs.

Examples of additional visibility for group members:

​​

D. Here you set whether the managers should be able to see an overall result and/or comments for one or more parent groups to which their own team belongs.

Examples of additional visibility for group owners:

​

On the scheduling page, there a two different views. The List view allows you to see ongoing, upcoming, and past schedulings for all groups that you have access to. You can set your own time range or easily select between 30 and 90 days. This view helps administrators and/or managers to see all schedules made within the organization or the groups they are responsible for. 

The Timeline view is a calendar where you can see all schedulings made for one specific group. The timeline shows 5 months at a time, but you can of course go back or forward. This view can make it easier for you to see when pulses are scheduled. 

Step-by-step for how-to schedule questions:

1. Go to Schedule > Scheduling

In the list view click on “Add schedule”: 

In the timeline view click on "Add new pulse": 

2. Choose if you want to schedule an existing pulse or create a new one.
If you have not created your own pulse before and are looking for instructions, please read this guide: Create your own pulse.

3. Continue by selecting one or several groups for the scheduling.

You can select several groups, or deselect certain groups that you want to exclude from the scheduling.

Please note that you will not be able to see the total results if you deselect a group within a hierarchy, you will instead get separate results for each group.

If you select a whole group hierarchy, without deselecting any groups, you’ll be able to see results for each group as well as the total results for the top group. Read more about what to think of when scheduling to several groups in this guide. 

If you have attributes installed in your &frankly-account, you can also schedule towards a specific segment by activating the advanced settings.

You can only select one segment but within a segment, you can select several values.

Want to learn more about how to use and add attributes? Read this guide: User attributes and data segmentation.

4. Results visibility (default settings)
The next step is to decide the result visibility settings, which determines what the managers and users will see from the results.

The preselected settings for results visibility will allow users and managers to see:

• Their own individual answers
• Results for the groups they are a direct member in, owner of, or have viewing rights to
• Overall results for the recipient group they belong to

To Note: Administrators in &frankly can always access the results for all groups in the tool.

5. Results visibility (advanced settings)

To note: If you would like to keep the default standard results visibility settings as they are - proceed directly to the next step in this guide.

With the advanced settings, you have many options to customize the visibility of the result for your scheduling. You can adjust desired visibility for the group members/groups owners' own group as well as for the recipient groups.

What is “Their own group”?
The own group is the group that the individual is either a:

• Direct member of
• The group owner of
• Have viewing rights to

Do you want to learn more about what a direct group member is? Read this guide. 

What are the “recipient groups”?
The recipient groups are all the parent groups that have belonging subgroups. 

In the section “Within recipient groups” you can adjust results visibility on additional levels.

You can decide if you for example want employees and/or managers to see the overall results for the whole organization or their own department.

To note: group members and owners will not be able to see results for groups they don't belong to. They can only see the total results for the selected group if they are a member or owner of a subgroup. 

6. Decide when and how often questions should be sent (default settings)

Decide when you want the questions to open by selecting a date and a time. By default, the questions will close for answering until Sunday 24.00 and the results are out Monday morning. 

To note: If you would like to extend the survey to two weeks or change the end date, see step 7 in this guide.

Here you also have the option to set the pulse to repeat automatically to a set frequency of either, weekly, biweekly, monthly or bimonthly:

7. Decide when questions should close (advanced settings)

By activating the advanced settings you can tailor which day the questions will close. A pulse can stay open for a maximum of two weeks, Monday to Sunday the week after.

To note: Regardless of which day the questions close, the final results (for example the final response rates, KPI:s and exports) will always be available on Monday the week after the pulse closes.

8. Preview and/or customize the notifications email
A question notification is sent to the recipients when the questions open and a reminder is automatically sent on Fridays 12.00 to those who haven't answered.  

Preview the question notification email by clicking the preview button:

By activating the advanced settings you can also customize the notification email. Click on "Custom notification email" to edit the headline and add a custom message to the email. 
If you want to edit the subject line, follow the instructions in this guide.

9. Enable or disable the results email notification

To note: you can edit the preselected settings for results email in your accounts settings under Account > Emails.

How-to video: Scheduling

How to preview a scheduled pulse:

Step-by-step:

1. Go to Schedule > Scheduling

2. Filter the date range for when the pulse you want to preview is scheduled: 

3. Click on the “three dots” next to scheduling and select “Preview”:

Delete a scheduled pulse

Step-by-step:

1. Go to Schedule > Scheduling and filter the date range for when the pulse you want to remove is scheduled. 

2. Click on the “three dots” next to scheduling and select “remove”:

Keep in mind that if you delete previous schedulings, the results for the week(s) you delete will disappear. 

Pause a repeating pulse:

Step-by-step:

1. Go to Schedule > Scheduling and flter on the time span for the dates when the pulse you want to pause is scheduled. 

3. Click the three dots next to scheduling and select "Edit":

3. Click "Next" to go to the settings for date and repetition and change the date of the last day of repetition. Note that you need to select the last week that the questions were sent out historically in order for the pulse to be paused.

If you would like to start the scheduling again you can do this by scheduling the pulse again with a new start date.

The idea of sending pulses is to quickly and on a regular basis get relevant input for a continuous dialogue with the employees. 

You can activate a pulse any day of the week. Per default, pulses will close on Sunday the same week. If you want a pulse to close on another day, turn on the advanced settings and set the end date. You can select any day up until Sunday the week after.

Pulses can stay open for maximum two weeks, Monday to Sunday the week after. But note that if a pulse opens, for example, on a Friday, it will be at most 9 days and not 14 days.

Calculated reports and exports are available on all results pages on Monday mornings the week after the pulse closes.

When scheduling a pulse you can select several groups, or deselect certain groups that you want to exclude from the scheduling. You will not be able to see the total results if you deselect a group within a hierarchy, you will instead get separate results for each group. 

If you select a whole group hierarchy, without deselecting any groups, you’ll be able to see results for each group as well as the total results for the top group. 

If you want total results for all groups but need to exclude employees from a survey, we recommend that you temporarily deactivate these employees instead. 

Examples: 

In these examples there are two group hierarchies named “Company” and “Project”.

Example 1:

Selecting a whole group hierarchy

In this example the group hierarchy named “Company” is selected, without deselecting any of its subgroups.
Since no subgroups have been deselected, the result will be presented for each of the subgroups within the group hierarchy, as well as a total result for the top group “Company”. 

Example 2:

Deselecting a group within a group hierarchy

In this example the group hierarchy named “Company” is selected while one of its subgroups named “Customer success” has been deselected. Since one of the subgroups within the hierarchy have been deselected, the result will be presented for each of the subgroups separately and no total result for the all groups will be presented. 

Example 3:

Selecting several group hierarchies

In this example, the two group hierarchies “Company” and “Projects' have been selected. This will give a result for each group, as well as a total result for each of the hierarchies. There will be no joint total result for the two hierarchies together.

Pulses can stay open for a maximum of two weeks, Monday to Sunday the week after. 
To extend an already scheduled pulse to keep open for two weeks, follow these steps:

1. Go to Schedule > Scheduling
2. Click on the scheduling you want to edit
3. Click on "Edit dates and emails":

4. Change to Sunday the week after the date the questions were asked

 On Monday morning, the day after the pulse closed, you will be able to see the calculated results on all results pages. 

Unfortunately, it is not possible to extend a pulse that has already closed. 

However, it is possible to extend ongoing pulses one extra week if they were only one week long at the beginning, (the setting has to be unlocked first, send us an email to help@andfrankly.com). Pulses that are already two weeks long cannot be extended any further. 

Please note that only pulses that had you have created yourselves can be open for two weeks, read this guide for instructions

The majority of the &frankly standard questions are translated to the following languages: 

• Vietnamese
• Chinese (Simplified) 
• Chinese (Traditional) 
• Danish 
• Dutch 
• Estonian 
• Finnish 
• French 
• German 
• Italian 
• Latvian 
• Lithuanian 
• Norwegian 
• Polish 
• Portugese (Brazil) 
• Russian 
• Spanish 
• Swedish 

Before adding translations to your questions, make sure to check out this article and your account settings to ensure that you allow users to choose their own preferred language.

Translations can be added when you add a new question or edit one of your existing questions that is open for editing.

1. Select a new question template or an editable question and go to the “Content” tab.
   This is where you add the default version of the question, which isn't associated with any particular language - it can be anything. This version is used as a fall back version if:
   
   
   • There are no other translations, or
   • There are no other translations that match the language a user has selected, and there are no translations that match the company default language (can be Swedish or English). 

    

   
   
   
   
2. Go to the  “Translations” tab and click on the plus-icon to add a language and a translation.
   The “flags” that you add will be matched to the “flag” a user has selected. Therefore, make sure to always add English as a flag - even if you have written the default version with English text. 

Contact help@andfrankly.com if you want to add translations to locked questions. 

When questions are sent from &frankly, the system always checks: 

• The account settings: are users allowed to select their own preferred language? Yes/No
• The account default language: which language should we display if the user’s selected language doesn’t exist? Swedish/English/Norwegian/Danish
• The questions: are there any translations that match the languages that users have selected. Yes/no

If there are translations that match the account’s fixed or user’s selected language, we will display the translation. 

What happens if the user has selected a language that doesn’t exist for the question?
The system will then look at the account default language (which can be Swedish, English, Norwegian or Danish), and see if there is a translation in this language (either Swedish, English, Norwegian or Danish). If there are translations in Swedish, English, Norwegian or Danish, this will show. If there are no translations added in Swedish, English, Norwegian or Danish, the default version will show. 

Summary of the priority: 

1. The system tries to match available translations with the account’s fixed or user's selected language. 
2. If the user’s selected language doesn’t exist, the system will display the translation that matches your account default language. 
3. If there are no translations in the user’s selected language, account default language, the system will display the default version of the question. This is what you’ve added in the “Content” section. 

With quick questions, you can easily send out single questions to your team or organization. You can, for instance, evaluate a meeting with a quick follow-up question or gather input before your next conference. You can make sure you get that extra feedback, without having to create and schedule a full survey.

You can use this function when you want to get feedback via one single question. The feature allows you to easily send a question to your team or organization, at any given time.

If you want to follow one or several questions over time, we recommend that you create or schedule a pulse instead. 

Step-by-step:

1. Go to Questions > Quick questions
   
   
2. Create your own question or choose one from the library.
   If you want to create your own question, first select a template and then add the text. Or if you want to send a question from the library, click on the button “Choose from library”. 
   
   
3. Select a group and choose result accessibility for the question. The results access decides what the team members should see (individuals) and what the manager/leader (group owner) should see.
   
   
4. Choose a time and date, or click “Now” to send the questions immediately. If you want to save the question but send it later, click on the button “Save draft”. 

Questions saved as drafts will be shown under “Draft”. If you activate the question directly, it will be shown under “Recently asked / upcoming questions.”

You can also see an overview of your drafts and upcoming questions. You can delete future scheduled quick questions, but not the ones you have already asked. To delete future questions, hit the trash can and confirm.

The purpose of the quick questions is to send out single questions easily to your team or organization, without having to create and schedule a full survey. You can activate a quick question any day of the week but it will always end on Sunday the same week. 

You can delete future scheduled quick questions, but not the ones you have already asked. To delete future questions, hit the icon looking like a trash can and confirm.

As an administrator, you can add questions to your company library. This will make it easier for you and your colleagues to find your favorite questions when creating a pulse.

To add a question to the company library, open the question and click on the button "Add to the company library" showing in the top right corner. 

Later, when you want to add the questions to a new pulse, you'll find them under the section "Company questions".