Use of The Gallup Q12 Employee Engagement tool. Permissions and legalities of doing so?

[Stephen Lynch]

We obtained the 12 statements from Gallup's published books (which are in the public domain). We recommend our clients read these books, and we always reference the Gallup organization and attribute copyright whenever we refer to the survey. What are the implications of using these 12 statements in an employee engagement survey? Does one need to obtain permission from Gallup to use it, or can you survey people using the 12 statements and credit Gallup's copyright appropriately?

How do you use this tool? How do you attribute copyright? Do you ask for permission from Gallup?

Any suggestions or learnings people could share on this subject would be much appreciated.

[Abhishek Mittal]

Hi Stephen,

I was previously a part of Gallup's consulting team. As far as I know, while you may reference the Q12 while talking about employee engagement (attributing copyrights), you can't use the Q12 statements to run a survey on your own.
If you will contact them, a member of the sales / consulting team will get back to you to understand your specific requirements, scope the project and submit a quote.

Abhishek

[Stephen Lynch]

Thank you for this information Abhishek

Kind regards

Stephen

[Brent Shaw]

Stephen, in addition to all the responses you've received on this, I'll add one more. We work with Gallup on our engagement program, and one thing I've noticed about them is their sensitivity to copyright and other intellectual property issues. They not only own the copyright to their Q12, they claim to have coined the phrase "employee engagement." They don't own the copyright to the phrase, but I think if they would if they could.

[Stephen Lynch]

Thank you for all the valuable responses I have received.

Moving forward - what alternative survey tools/questions do people on this forum use and recommend for measuring employee engagement?

My ideal criteria:
Research based
Widely used
Freely available for anyone to use
Simple to administer - easy to understand
Provides objective - quantitative data

Any suggestions welcome (but I don't want anyone trying to sell me anything please)

Regards

Stephen

[Eric Nielsen]

The Utrecht Work Engagement Scale is a good one to use. Go here and then click on "research" in the left column and then on "tests".

[Stephen Lynch]

Thank you Eric.

I will investigate this now

Kind regards

Stephen

[Jean Douglas, CMC]

Stephen,
I have allowed individuals to use my survey items (mostly academics for their research thesis) as long as I get credit for the survey design. However, I believe that you wish to use the engagement survey you can acquire for your own business purposes (gain revenue) so it isn't really a good idea for any of us who have taken the time to develop our own surveys and methodologies to give them away (free) for someone else to sell.

I appreciate your need to have an engagement survey, but perhaps you should hire someone to create one for your firm's use. That way you will have the reliability and validity data on hand for clients who wish to know this information.

[George Gillies]

There is actually dispute about this. A decision in 2004 said Gallup had no copyright on the statements. Not sure where it stands now or if Gallup appealed the decision.

Gallup, Inc. v. Kenexa Corp., No. Civ.A. 00-5523 (E.D. Pa. November 8, 2004).

Four years of copyright litigation in district court over employee surveys ended when the court held that Gallup made a mistake on the day it filed its copyright application. Applying what it called a "harsh" rule, the court dismissed Gallup's infringement claim because the copyrighted work at issue was slightly different from the deposit copy of the work submitted with Gallup's copyright application.

Gallup, renowned for its public opinion polls, sued Kenexa Corporation, alleging that Kenexa's employee satisfaction survey copied elements of Gallup's "Q12" survey. Gallup applied for and received a copyright registration for the Q12 in 1999. Gallup’s application stated that Gallup created the Q12 in 1992. What the application did not say, however, was that Gallup refined and improved the Q12 between 1992 and 1997 or 1998. For example, between 1992 and 1998, Gallup altered the wording of various Q12 questions and added one additional survey question. The deposit copy Gallup filed with its application was the updated Q12, rather than the original work that existed in 1992.

Kenexa moved for summary judgment, contending that Gallup's copyright registration was invalid. Gallup argued that the discrepancies between the original work and the deposit copy only raised a "technical defect" in the application, which was insufficient to invalid it. Agreeing with Kenexa, the court held that defects such as a typographical error on application may not invalidate a registration, but that substantive differences between a work and a deposit copy will. Relying on Kodadek v. MTV Networks, Inc., 152 F.3d 1209 (9th Cir. 1998), the court held that copyright applicants must deposit “bona fide” copies of their works that are “virtually identical to the original.” Because Gallup included the updated version of the Q12 with its copyright application, Gallup failed to deposit a copy of the original work created in 1992 and did not hold a valid copyright registration.

[Jean Douglas, CMC]

This is very interesting. I wonder if it is only applicable in the USA. It is interesting for more than the legal issues that you have given us an example of.

Most surveys include survey items that can be found in more than one survey. There is a limited number of ways that you can state a simple item and so it is not unusual to see identical items in different surveys. What the professionals try to do is make sure that there is not a substantial number of identical items and if so, try to to reword them.

Gallup is the only firm that I am aware of that has taken the extra step of actually filing a copyright legally. Most simply use the circle c - to show it.

However, the items are not the key to Gallup's success - it is the analysis and interpretation of the results and the advice they give. I suspect that they could take the results of practically any well-written survey and provide the same quality of advice they do now.

Note: I do not work for Gallup nor have I ever. In fact they are one of my competitors. I do however respect the firm and the reseach they have conducted. Without the caliber of competition in the market place we would not be striving to create the best survey processes we can.

[Eric Nielsen]

this judgement was vacated. http://altlaw.org/v1/cases/44635 Gallup was found to have properly copyrighted the items.

01.02.2006 19:02
Gallup and Kenexa Settle Outstanding Lawsuit

WAYNE, Pa., Feb. 1 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Kenexa(R) , a leading provider of talent acquisition and retention solutions, today announced the resolution of a lawsuit brought by Gallup against Kenexa in 2000. The settlement resolves Gallup's claim for copyright infringement relating to a survey instrument known as the Gallup Q12. The settlement, the material terms of which are confidential, brings the lawsuit to an end.

[Craig Althof]

I didn't see that anyone else brought this up, so just to clarify-anything that is "published" does not become "public domain". PD means it's been around since dirt and the copyright has expired, so it's up for grabs. Think about the song "Oh Susanna"....
Others have clarified that Gallup has certainly protected their work, as they should. There is a lot more to developing a good survey question than people think, and they are masters at the wording and analysis games.
One thing that's a little-known fact...when the US gov't publishes something it's normally not copyright-protected, as it is funded by the taxpayers. I've spent a good deal of time poking around on the Dept of Defense websites, but you really have to be careful where you try to go these days!

Legalities aside, the power of the Q12 instrument as noted earlier is the huge database that has been built, and the way the results are sliced and diced. There is a good deal of interplay among the items, as designed by Gallup. That is what they do, after all.

I was a "master" for our Q-12 efforts, and it was the start of my long strange trip down the engagement road. Then, Blessing/White came along and fanned my interest in the game. Those two together have been part of the most rewarding elements of my career. Now, the EEN is here to keep my head fed as I continue the journey...thank you David and all!

The Q-12 follow-up / spin-off books, by the way, are all excellent...from Soar with Your Strengths on through Strength-based Leadership.

(an aside...hey Doug, is that you gigging at the Isle of Wight?? I was there, dude!)

[Ethan Bondelid]

Great discussion guys!
Q12 was created by Curt Coffman some time ago, back when Bob Dole was running for president. Curt was also the co-author of First, Break All The Rules (new Facebook Group)
With some updated research Curt has created a new engagement index that has shown stronger indicators to outcomes over the last 5 years. The Coffman Organization has some flexible options for utilizing the tool and it's national benchmarks. I'd be happy to discuss them with anyone who might be interested.