Building a Survey Template

Survey templates are built in Settings and define the questions, logic, and recommendations that drive your discovery process. This article walks through each part of building a survey template, from basic settings through recommendations.

Creating a Survey Template

Navigate to Settings > Documents > Surveys to see the list of survey templates in your account.

On this screen: The main Settings navigation. The left sidebar shows sections including Documents, Governance, Integrations, and more. Clicking Documents expands it to show sub-items including Surveys, Document Templates, and Attachment Types.

On this screen: The Questionnaires page has Active and Archived tabs and columns for Survey, Published?, and Tags, in that order. Click a row to edit it. + Add A Questionnaire appears in the header. Select rows to reveal bulk Duplicate and Delete on the Active tab, or Restore on the Archived tab.

Click + Add A Questionnaire to create a new survey template. Removing a questionnaire archives it, and it can be restored from the Archived tab.

Survey Settings

After you save a new questionnaire, the Survey tab defines the high-level information about your survey template: its name, introductory text, submission behavior, and team assignments.

On this screen: The Add a Questionnaire form contains a required Name field and a Published? toggle showing Published or Draft. Save and Cancel appear in the header. Save the questionnaire to open the full editor.

After saving the new questionnaire, use the Survey tab to configure these settings:

• Name: Give your survey template a meaningful name.
• Published?: Only published survey templates are available for users to fill out. Leave the toggle set to Draft while building.
• Introduction: Displayed at the top of the survey when someone takes it.
• Thank You: Displayed after the survey is submitted.
• Redirect after completion?: Optionally redirect the respondent to a URL after submission.
• Tags: Comma-separated tags for organizing survey templates.
• Teams: Assign the survey template to one or more teams. This controls which surveys appear when users filter by team on the Surveys page.

On this screen: The Survey tab in Edit Questionnaire contains Name, Published?, Introduction, Thank You, and a Redirect after completion? toggle. Turning on redirect reveals Completion URL. Tags accepts comma-separated tags, and Teams is a multi-select with the placeholder All teams. Leave Teams empty to make the questionnaire available to all teams. Save and Cancel appear in the header.

Only published survey templates will be available to fill out.

On this screen: The Published? toggle shows Published when enabled and Draft when disabled. Click Save in the header to save the setting.

After saving the new questionnaire with Save, you will see additional tabs for building out the survey template. These tabs flow from left to right in the suggested order of completion.

On this screen: After the questionnaire is saved, the edit page shows five tabs inside the card, directly under the title with its Cancel and Save buttons, in order: Survey, Questions, Lookups, Calculations, and Recommendations. The Survey tab contains the questionnaire settings, and Save appears only on that tab. The other tabs save from their own slide-outs or dialogs.

Questions

Questions define what information you collect from respondents. Click the Questions tab, create a section with Add Survey Section, and then click + Add Question within that section to create your first question.

On this screen: The Questions tab shows an Add Survey Section button above the sections. Each section has a + Add Question button and a table with Question, Name, Type, and Required columns, in that order. Sections and questions can be dragged to reorder them. Select questions to reveal bulk Delete.

Each question has these fields:

• Question: The full text of the question displayed to respondents.
• Name: A short-form label used to reference this question’s response in lookups, calculations, and recommendations.
• Slug: Auto-generated after saving. Used in calculation expressions and lookup references.
• Type of Value: The kind of data you expect (Text, Number, Date, Checkbox, Email, or Phone).
• Minimum Length and Maximum Length: Optional size constraints for Text questions. Number questions use Minimum Value and Maximum Value, and Date questions use Minimum Date and Maximum Date.
• Name of Option and Value: Used to create a single-select dropdown. If you leave these blank, the respondent gets an open text field. If you add options, the survey presents a dropdown.

On this screen: The Add Question slide-out opens on the right, titled Add Question or Edit Question, and contains required Question and Name fields, a Type of Value dropdown with Text, Number, Date, Checkbox, Email, and Phone, and a Required? toggle showing Required or Optional. When editing a saved question, Slug is read-only. Depending on the type, additional controls include minimum and maximum length, value, or date, and Decimal Places for numbers. Cancel and Save appear at the top of the slide-out.

For questions with predefined choices, choose the appropriate Type of Value and add rows in Options, with a Name of Option and Value for each choice. Date questions do not support options.

On this screen: For a question with predefined choices, the Options section lists Name of Option, Value, and Default, in that order, with a remove button on each row. Click Add option to add another choice. Options are available for every Type of Value except Date. Cancel and Save appear at the top of the slide-out.

Lookups

Lookups let you map a question’s response to a derived value that can be used in calculations or recommendations. They work similarly to VLOOKUP in a spreadsheet.

For example, a question might ask “How big is it?” with options Small, Medium, Large, and Extra Large. A lookup could map Small to 10, Medium to 25, Large to 100, and Extra Large to 250.

Lookups can reference one or two questions. A two-question lookup creates a matrix of values (for example, wireless coverage based on both building type and network traffic).

Click the Lookups tab and then Add Lookup to create one.

On this screen: The Lookups tab shows an Add Lookup button above the table. Columns are Name, Value Type, Index 1, and Index 2, in that order. Select rows to reveal bulk Delete.

Each lookup has:

• Name: How this lookup is referenced in calculations and recommendations.
• Type of value to look up: The data type of the output.
• First value to associate (Index 1): A question whose response drives the lookup.
• Second value to associate (Index 2, optional): A second question for matrix lookups.

After you select the question or questions, the form shows a grid where you fill in the output value for each option combination.

On this screen: The Add Lookup or Edit Lookup slide-out opens on the right and contains Name, Type of value to look up, First value to associate (Index 1), and Second value to associate (Index 2, optional). Saved lookups also show a read-only Slug. With one question selected, the grid has Selected Value and Associated Value columns. Enter an associated value for each option. Cancel and Save appear at the top of the slide-out.

Calculations

Calculations take the results of questions and lookups and let you derive new values using arithmetic. They can also reference other calculations. See Survey Calculations for details on basic calculations, conditional statements, and the available operators.

Click the Calculations tab and then Add Calculation.

On this screen: The Add Calculation or Edit Calculation slide-out opens on the right and has Name of the result and Calculation to be performed, with the expression placeholder floors * area_per_floor. Saved calculations also show a read-only Slug. Cancel and Save appear at the top of the slide-out. A reference panel contains Operators for arithmetic, grouping, comparisons, and conditional expressions, followed by Questions, Lookups, and Calculations. Click an operator or operand to insert it into the expression.

Recommendations

Recommendations connect your survey logic to the services, governance items, or products you deliver. Based on the responses, lookups, and calculations, you define what should be recommended and when.

Click the Recommendations tab and then Add Recommendation.

On this screen: The Add Recommendation or Edit Recommendation slide-out opens on the right and starts with Item Type and Item, followed by Quantity, whose placeholder is Survey value or calculation. Under When does the recommendation apply?, choose Always or Only when. Only when reveals Survey value or calculation, Condition, and the choice to Select a comparison value or use Or type to enter one. Cancel and Save appear at the top of the slide-out.

Each recommendation defines:

• Quantity: The survey value or calculation that determines the quantity of the recommended item.
• Item Type: Service, Governance, or Product.
  • Service: The quantity becomes the quantity of the service on the project.
  • Governance: The quantity is either the number of hours or the percentage of total effort, depending on the governance item’s configuration.
• Item: The specific service, governance item, or product to recommend.
• When does the recommendation apply?
  • Always: The recommendation is included every time.
  • Only when: Define a condition (a value, a comparison operator, and a target) that must be true for the recommendation to appear.

When you select a service with subservices, subservice quantity overrides become available.

On this screen: When the selected service has subservices, a Subservices section appears below the condition fields. Its columns are Subservice and Quantity, in that order. Each Quantity dropdown offers Default or a survey value or calculation. Select Default to clear an override.

Taking the Survey

Once the survey template is published, users can take it from the Surveys page or within a project. The survey displays the introductory text, followed by all questions in order. After filling in answers and clicking Calculate, the platform processes the responses and shows recommended services with calculated quantities.

On this screen: A walkthrough of the end-to-end survey workflow. Starting from the Surveys page, a user selects a published survey from the “Take a Survey” tab and clicks to open it. The survey form displays the introductory text at the top, followed by all active questions in order — text fields, number inputs, or single-select dropdowns depending on the question type. After filling in answers and clicking Calculate, the platform processes the responses against the configured lookups, calculations, and recommendations. The results screen shows a list of recommended services with calculated quantities. The user can then click to create a new project pre-populated with those services and quantities.