There are two types of surveys which are important to us in this work. The easiest one to conduct is one undertaken at the end of training to understand how the training met the needs of those who came to take part in it. This gives almost instant feedback on the effectiveness of your training and provides pointers on where things may be improved for the future.
But the more important survey is one conducted some months later to see whether the training has actually made any practical difference. Unless the training really has resulted in an increase in successful new businesses then we are wasting our time.
But surveys in the developing World are notoriously difficult; gathering sufficient objective data is a challenge, and it is important to keep things as simple as possible. We have developed two simple surveys, which can be downloaded here.
Results of survey conducted 9-14 months after training
Results of post training feedback survey