Klaus Abberger, Matthias Banner, Andreas Dibiasi

15. November 2013

Firms’ Perception of

Business Tendency Surveys Results from a meta survey in the services sector

2

Outline

Introduction

Survey details

The questionnaire

Selected results

Who and how?

Business situation

Capacity utilization

Shortage of qualified labour

Perception of business tendency surveys

Summary

Outline

3

Aim and development

Meta survey to get insight into the

structure of respondents

Response behaviour

perception of business tendency survey by respondents

perception and response behaviour to selected business tendency

questions

Target sector: Services with a subdivision into hotels/restaurants and other

services

Questionnaire was pretested in various personal interviews with regular

respondents of tendency surveys

Introduction

4

Survey details

Field period: between 10. June and 31. August 2013

Responses: 1726

Response rate: 64%

Introduction

5 5

Questionnaire

6 6

Selected results

7 7

Who and how?

Who?

8

Selected results

Other

Administrator

Departmental head

Owner/manager/board member

0 300 600 900

Person to complete the survey (DLU)

Who?

9

Selected results

Other

Administrator

Departmental head

Owner/manager/board member

0 100 200 300 400

Person to complete the survey (GGU)

Who?

10

Selected results

Procurement

Sales

Statistics

Marketing

Other

Staff Position

Controlling

Accounts

Management

0 300 600 900

Department responsible for KOF− Surveys (DLU)

Who?

11

Selected results

Procurement

Marketing

Controlling

Other

Staff Position

Sales

Statistics

Accounts

Management

0 100 200 300 400

Department responsible for KOF− Surveys (GGU)

How?

12

Selected results

no Answer

...answered when a reminder is received

...answered just before the deadline for submission

...answered when time permits

...answerd immediatly after receiving

0 200 400 600

KOF Business Tendency Surveys are usually.... (DLU)

How?

13

Selected results

no Answer

...answered when a reminder is received

...answered just before the deadline for submission

...answered when time permits

...answerd immediatly after receiving

0 50 100 150 200

KOF Business Tendency Surveys are usually.... (GGU)

How?

14

Selected results

no Answer

more than three

three

two

one

0 250 500 750 1000

Number of people involved (DLU)

How?

15

Selected results

no Answer

more than three

three

two

one

0 100 200 300 400

Number of people involved (GGU)

How?

16

Selected results

no Answer

>60

How?

17

Selected results

no Answer

>60

18 18

Business situation

Business situation

19

Selected results

Inventory

Other

Customer frequency

General sentiment in the sector/overall economy

Incoming orders

Enquiries/offers

Quantity of sales/volume

Liquidity

Cost situation

Corporate earnings/margin

Turnover

0 300 600 900

important rather important neutral rather insignificant insignificant no answer

Assessment of Business Situation DLU

Business situation

20

Selected results

Inventory

Other

General sentiment in the sector/overall economy

Incoming orders

Liquidity

Enquiries/offers

Quantity of sales/volume

Cost situation

Corporate earnings/margin

Customer frequency

Turnover

0 100 200 300 400

important rather important neutral rather insignificant insignificant no answer

Assessment of Business Situation GGU

Seasonal adjustment

21

Selected results

Other

Elimination of seasonal fluctuations not possible or feasible

Empirical values

Comparison with average trends in the same months of previous years

Comparison with previous year

0 300 600 900

Elimination of seasonal fluctuations (DLU)

Seasonal adjustment

22

Selected results

Other

Empirical values

Elimination of seasonal fluctuations not possible or feasible

Comparison with average trends in the same months of previous years

Comparison with previous year

0 100 200 300 400

Elimination of seasonal fluctuations (GGU)

Business Expectations

Macroeconomic imports / exports

Macroeconomic domestic production / investment

Trends in household earnings /labour market situation

Economic forecasts for our sector / for the overall economy

Political/general legal framework

General sentiment in the sector / overall economy

General sentiment in the client sector

Factors/indicators of own business

0 300 600 900

important rather important neutral rather insignificant insignificant no answer

Assessment of Business Expectations DLU

23

Business Expectations

24

Macroeconomic imports / exports

Macroeconomic domestic production / investment

Political/general legal framework

Trends in household earnings /labour market situation

Economic forecasts for our sector / for the overall economy

General sentiment in the sector / overall economy

General sentiment in the client sector

Factors/indicators of own business

0 100 200 300 400

important rather important neutral rather insignificant insignificant no answer

Assessment of Business Expec tations GGU

25 25

Capacity utilization

Factors for assessing capacity utilization

26

Selected results

licenses

other

material consump.

area

capital

tech. capacity

customer freq.

prod. per employee

employees

working hours

0 300 600 900

important rather important neutral rather insignificant insignificant no answer

Capacity Utilisation DLU

Factors for assessing capacity utilization

27

Selected results

licenses

other

tech. capacity

capital

area

material consump.

working hours

prod. per employee

employees

customer freq.

0 100 200 300 400

important rather important neutral rather insignificant insignificant no answer

Capacity Utilisation GGU

Relevance continuous

17494216%84%

0

300

600

900

Irrelevant Relevant

Question is irrelevant for our company Continuous Capacity Utilization DLU

Klaus Abberger 28

Relevance continuous

Klaus Abberger 29

6138614%86%

0

100

200

300

400

Irrelevant Relevant

Question is irrelevant for our company Continuous Capacity Utilization GGU

Relevance categorical (personnel and technical)

Klaus Abberger 30

12199411%89%

0

300

600

900

Irrelevant Relevant

Question is irrelevant for our company Categorial Capacity Utilization DLU

Relevance categorical (personnel and technical)

Klaus Abberger 31

7237516%84%

0

100

200

300

400

Irrelevant Relevant

Question is irrelevant for our company Categorial Capacity Utilization personal factors GGU

Relevance categorical (personnel)

Klaus Abberger 32

13897712%88%

0

300

600

900

Irrelevant Relevant

Question is irrelevant for our company Categorial Capacity Utilization personal factors DLU

Relevance categorical (personnel)

Klaus Abberger 33

7836917%83%

0

100

200

300

400

Irrelevant Relevant

Question is irrelevant for our company Categor ial Capacity Utilization personal factors GGU

Relevance categorical (technical)

Klaus Abberger 34

44567040%60%

0

300

600

900

Irrelevant Relevant

Question is irrelevant for our company Categor ial Capacity Utilization technical factors DLU

Relevance categorical (technical)

Klaus Abberger 35

14530232%68%

0

100

200

300

400

Irrelevant Relevant

Question is irrelevant for our company Categor ial Capacity Utilization technical factors GGU

Capacity utilization, categorical, personnel

0

100

200

40 60 80 100 120

co

un

t

0 100 200density

Histogram Categorial CU DLU(only personal−related capacity)

Klaus Abberger 36

Capacity utilization, categorical, technical

Klaus Abberger 37

0

50

100

150

40 60 80 100 120

co

un

t

0 4080120160density

Histogram Categorial CU DLU(only non−personnel−related, technical capacity)

Capacity utilization, categorical, personnel

Klaus Abberger 38

0

25

50

75

100

40 60 80 100 120

co

un

t

0 255075100density

Histogram Categorial CU GGU(only personal−related capacity)

Capacity utilization, categorical, technical

Klaus Abberger 39

0

20

40

60

40 60 80 100 120

co

un

t

0 20 40 60density

Histogram Categorial CU GGU(only non−personnel−related, technical capacity)

Capacity utilization, categorical, average

Klaus Abberger 40

0

100

200

300

40 60 80 100 120

co

un

t

0 100 200density

Histogram Categorial CU DLU (average)

Capacity utilization, continuous

41

Selected results

0

100

200

0 30 60 90

co

un

t

0 100 200density

Histogram Continuous CU DLU(with companies that cannot cope an increase in demand)

Capacity utilization, difference

0

30

60

90

0 50

co

un

t

0 30 60 90density

Diffrence in Capacity UtilizationCategorial and Continous questioning DLU

Klaus Abberger 42

Capacity utilization, categorical, average

Klaus Abberger 43

0

25

50

75

100

40 60 80 100 120

co

un

t

0 25 50 75100density

Histogram Categorial CU GGU (average)

Capacity utilization, continuous

44

Selected results

0

50

100

40 60 80 100

co

un

t

0 255075100125density

Histogram Continuous CU GGU(with companies that cannot cope an increase in demand)

Capacity utlizitaion, difference

Klaus Abberger 45

0

10

20

30

40

−20 0 20 40

co

un

t

0 10203040density

Diffrence in Capacity UtilizationCategorial and Continous questioning GGU

46 46

Shortage of qualified labour

A problem?

47

Selected results

455638

23

41%57%

2%

0

300

600

900

Yes No no Answer

Staff Shortage DLU

A problem?

48

Selected results

114322

11

26%72%

2%

0

100

200

300

400

Yes No no Answer

Staff Shortage GGU

Kind of problem?

49

Selected results

...the excessive costs of employing staff with relevant qualifications

...the lack of availability of staff with relevant qualifications

0 300 600 900

If there were problems recruiting suitably qualified staff, this was attributable to... (DLU)

Kind of problem?

50

Selected results

...the excessive costs of employing staff with relevant qualifications

...the lack of availability of staff with relevant qualifications

0 100 200 300 400

If there were problems recruiting suitably qualified staff, this was attributable to... (GGU)

51 51

Perception of business tendency surveys

Interesting?

52

Selected results

70

267

431

215

11221

(6%)

(24%)

(39%)

(19%)

(10%)(2%)

0

300

600

900

important rather important neutral rather insignificant insignificant no answer

Significance of Business Tendency Surveys DLU

Interesting?

53

Selected results

55

135

161

53

349

(12%)

(30%)

(36%)

(12%)

(8%)(2%)

0

100

200

300

400

important rather important neutral rather insignificant insignificant no answer

Significance of Business Tendency Surveys GGU

54 54

Summary

55

Summary

Often survey respondents are managers and they need mostly not more than 15 minutes for the questionnaire

Turnover and profits are important factors for the assessment of the business situation

Factor within the own business are most important for the assessment of the business expectations

Capacity utilization in the services sector is strongly connected to personnel factors

Summary