EQUALITY GUIdE - KU Leuven

36 Equality Guide
3.4.1. Personnel survey
The first part, organizational climate, contains 50 items divided into six subparts. This
part is about personnel’s perceptions about their working unit. The respondents are
presented with statements about their department and they have to indicate by means
of a Likert scale to what degree the statement fits their department (1 = not at all, 2 =
not, 3 = moderate, 4 = pretty much, 5 = very much). The six subparts are: working
atmosphere, decision-making, information and communication, networks, rules and
control, handling of new colleagues. This first part gathers information about the following:
! What is the working atmosphere in the department? Do colleagues gossip about
each other? Do colleagues respect each other’s culture? Is there a competitive
atmosphere or is the emphasis more on good relations between colleagues?
! How are decisions made? Is everyone involved or are they made informally by a
limited group of people?
! How is important information for employees communicated? Does everyone understand
the information? Does everyone get the chance to communicate things?
! How are relationships between employees? And between employees and their superiors?
Are there any cliques? Are there in-groups and out-groups in certain departments?
Who’s in and who’s out?
! Do employees get enough feedback from their superiors? Are there unwritten rules
about the way to dress, the way to behave or about working at home or at the university?
Is unfounded criticism common?
! Are new employees welcomed properly to the department? Do they get a mentor
when starting the job?
The second part of the survey deals with the respondent’s well-being at the university
during the past year. This part is based on an existing climate survey at the University
of Colorado at Boulder 59 . The respondent is asked how often she or he felt accepted,
humiliated, valued, excluded, different from others, welcome, threatened, free to be
her/himself, thwarted, respected and neglected on campus during the past year. Next,
the respondent has to indicate whether she or he has encountered discrimination, intimidation,
bullying or aggression and if so, by whom (students, other members of
personnel). They are presented with several grounds of discrimination (gender, age,
skin colour, origin, sexual orientation, ideas, etc) which they can select and they can
also fill in a ground for discrimination themselves.
The third part of the questionnaire is more about attitudes and opinions. It contains
two subparts. In the first, respondents have to indicate to what extent they agree with
general statements about diversity at the university (e.g. I think that more diversity at
the VUB will contribute to more tolerance for each other). In the second part, they are
presented with a list of projects that have been undertaken or will be undertaken (e.g. a
mentoring project for students and PhD students). They have to indicate how important
they think those projects are (e.g. 1 = very important, 4 = very unimportant).
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http://www.colorado.edu/pba/surveys/climate/01/index.htm.