Tool 115: Multivoting

AKA

Multi-Vote Technique

Classification

Decision Making (DM)

Tool description

The multivoting tool is used by teams to reduce a long list of items to a few items perceived as most important. Multivoting is a preferred list reduction method in that the final selection of top items is supported by all participants, since their votes directly contributed to the final items list.

Typical application

• To perform a democratic, quick item selection process to arrive at a decision based on votes given for a particular item by each participant of the team.

• To apply a series of votes to reduce a long list of items to a few most important or popular items.

• To identify and prioritize problems or activities from a large, previously brainstormed list.

Problem-solving phase

→	Select and define problem or opportunity
→	Identify and analyze causes or potential change
→	Develop and plan possible solutions or change
	Implement and evaluate solution or change
	Measure and report solution or change results
	Recognize and reward team efforts

Typically used by

	Research/statistics
	Creativity/innovation
	Engineering
2	Project management
	Manufacturing
4	Marketing/sales
	Administration/documentation
	Servicing/support
3	Customer/quality metrics
1	Change management

links to other tools

before

• Brainstorming

• Selection Window

• Phillips 66

• Round Robin Brainstorming

• Affinity Diagram

after

• Team Process Assessment

• Project Planning Log

• Activity analysis

• Action and Effect Diagram (AED)

• Action Plan

Notes and key points

• Ideal for large groups and long lists. Never multivote down to one item only!

• Multivoting on a list of 30–50 items can reduce the list to 4–6 items.

• Voting round rules

  • Only one vote per item.

  • First Round: Vote for one half (one-third for long list) of listed items.

  • Second Round: Vote for one-half of remaining items.

  • Next Rounds: Repeat step two until the list is reduced to 4–6 items.

Step-by-step procedure

• STEP 1 The team facilitator displays a list of items on a flip chrt or whiteboard and explains the multivoting process to the team.

• STEP 2 All participants vote for one-half of all items (the first round) and record their choices. See example List of 33 Customer Complaints.

• STEP 3 The facilitator collects all votes and identifies items selected. Items with the fewest votes are eliminated and the remaining 17 votes are circles on the flip charts for all participants to see.

• STEP 4 All participants vote again (second round) for one-half of the reduced list of items and record their choices. Reminder one vote per item!

• STEP 5 The facilitator collects all votes and repeats the process as in step 3.

• STEP 6 A third round reduces the list to 5 choices, as seen in the example.

• STEP 7 The last step calls for the drawing up of a final, prioritized list of 5 items. This list determines what next steps in the problem-solving process need to be taken by the team. Finally, date the prioritized list.

Example of tool application