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Feature - Surveys

Surveys in LinearB help you collect structured, anonymous feedback on developer experience, productivity, AI adoption, and tooling — then view results in real time to spot patterns and act fast. TL;D…

heather.hazell
Updated by heather.hazell

Surveys in LinearB help you collect structured, anonymous feedback on developer experience, productivity, AI adoption, and tooling — then view results in real time to spot patterns and act fast.

TL;DR

  • Create surveys using standardized topics with 1–5 agree-scale statements and optional comments.
  • Choose Managed Access (invite specific teams/groups) or Unlimited Access (open to everyone).
  • Manage survey status and participation in the Management tab.
  • Analyze results with topic averages, drill-down distributions, comments, and team heatmaps.
  • Privacy is built in: scores are hidden when responses are < 3.

Overview

Surveys let you measure how teams experience their day-to-day work — alongside your engineering data. Use them to:

  • Track developer experience and satisfaction over time.
  • Understand sentiment around AI-assisted development and tooling.
  • Compare teams with topic-level heatmaps.
  • Use comments and answer distributions to understand the “why.”

Each survey is made up of topics. Each topic includes a standardized set of 5–8 statements rated on a 1–5 agree scale (1 = strongly disagree, 5 = strongly agree). Higher scores are always better.

Before You Begin

  • You must be an Admin or have permission to manage Surveys.
  • Set up teams in Settings → Users & Teams to unlock team-based heatmaps.
  • Decide your access model:
    • Managed Access – invite specific teams/groups.
    • Unlimited Access – open to the entire organization.

1. Access Surveys

Open the Surveys area
  1. In the left navigation, click Surveys.
  2. You’ll land on the Management tab.

2. Management

What you see

The Management tab lists active and completed surveys. Each row includes:

  • Survey name
  • Start and end dates
  • Selected topics
  • Status – Running or Completed
  • Participants (Managed Access only)
  • Responses – submissions received out of total possible participants and participation rate

From here you can:

  • Create a new survey.
  • Preview survey questions.
  • Track participation.
  • End an active survey.
  • Open results for completed surveys.
Create a new survey
  1. Click + Create new.
  2. Complete the guided setup:

Step 1: Name

  • Enter a clear, recognizable survey name. This is visible to participants and in results.

Step 2: Topics

  • Select one or more predefined topics. Each topic includes standardized 1–5 agree-scale questions and optional comments.

Available topics:

  • Developer Experience
  • Satisfaction and Well-Being
  • Productivity and Workflow
  • Tools and Platforms
  • AI-Assisted Development
  • Collaboration and Team Culture
  • Code Quality and Maintainability
  • Developer Empowerment and Growth

Step 3: Participants

Choose who can respond:

  • Unlimited Access – open to the entire organization.
  • Managed Access – restrict participation to selected teams/groups.

When using Managed Access:

  • You can select one or multiple teams or groups from any level in your hierarchy.
  • Selecting a higher-level group includes all teams under it.
  • Anyone belonging to selected teams/groups during the survey period is eligible to respond.
  • Selected teams/groups appear here and again in the Summary before launch.

If you don’t select participants, the survey defaults to Unlimited Access.

Step 4: Launch

  • Review the summary.
  • Click Launch Survey.
  • The survey remains open until you manually end it from Management.
  • After closing, no additional responses can be collected.

3. Results Dashboard & Analysis

What you’ll see
  • Survey selector – switch between surveys.
  • Topic averages – mean score per topic.
  • Overall score – average across all topics and teams for that survey.
How scoring works
  • Each statement uses a 1–5 agree scale:
    • 1 = Strongly disagree
    • 5 = Strongly agree
  • Higher scores are better.
  • Topic score = average of that topic’s question scores.
  • Overall score = average across all topics and teams for that survey.
Heatmap

When teams are defined and participants are managed, you’ll see a topic heatmap:

  • The top row shows the all-teams average per topic.
  • Each team row shows that team’s average per topic.
  • Teams with too few responses show N/A.

Click a cell to view:

  • Topic questions
  • Average score per question
  • Answer distributions
  • Associated comments
Managed Access vs. Unlimited Access

Managed Access:

  • All invited teams appear in the heatmap, even with zero responses.
  • You’ll see total potential participants and participation rate.

Unlimited Access:

  • Any LinearB user can respond.
  • Only teams with responses appear in the heatmap.
Privacy & anonymity
  • Scores are hidden when a topic, question, or team has fewer than 3 responses.
  • This prevents results from being tied back to individuals.
No teams configured?
  • If users aren’t assigned to teams, results appear as topic bar charts instead of a heatmap.
  • You can still click into topic-level and question-level details and comments.

4. Tips

  • Use Managed Access when you need clean team-by-team comparisons.
  • Use Unlimited Access for lightweight, org-wide sentiment checks.
  • Pair heatmap outliers with comments to prioritize action areas.
  • Run surveys on a cadence (for example, quarterly) to track change over time.

5. Troubleshooting

Scores are missing or lower than expected
  • Check response counts — results are hidden when responses are < 3.
  • Confirm the survey is still running.
No heatmap, only bar charts
  • Ensure users are assigned to teams.
  • If the survey is Unlimited Access, only teams with responses appear in the heatmap.
Teams show N/A
  • This indicates there aren’t enough responses to display anonymized results.
  • Encourage participation from those teams.

How did we do?

Feature - Resource Allocation

Feature - Team Iterations & AI Iteration Summary

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