• The hidden cost of focusing on the wrong things  
  • Where surveys fit in decision-making
  • Conclusion

The hidden cost of focusing on the wrong things

If you don't decide what not to do, you don't end up neutral. You end up busy. You've probably seen some version of this.-

  • A roadmap that expands until nothing ships with conviction.
  • A team polishing low-impact work because it’s measurable.
  • R&D initiatives that survive because they’ve already consumed budget.
  • “Quick improvements” that accidentally break the one thing customers loved.
  • Decisions that drift from evidence to seniority, momentum, or who argued best in the room.

And the most expensive part is subtle: you don’t just lose time. You lose clarity. You spend the year making trade-offs without ever admitting you’re making them.

Where surveys fit in decision-making

As a decision-maker, your job is strategic allocation of resources: time, money, and human capital. Broadly, “de-prioritization” can be carried out across three areas: Business strategy, Operations, and Human resources: Below is a practical guide to using surveys in each area to identify non-priority work.

1) Business strategy

When you’re trying to grow revenue or strengthen your market position, your instinct will be to improve everything at once. That’s exactly where restraint becomes strategic.

i) Find initiatives misaligned with your North Star metric

A clear North Star metric is only useful if your initiatives genuinely align with it. Use a Strategy Alignment Survey (internal stakeholders, key customer segments, or both) to pressure-test alignment.

  • Example questions
  • “Which outcome should we optimize for this year?”
  • “Which of these initiatives most directly supports our North Star metric or other KPIs?”
  • What this helps you stop:
  • A classic example would be launching a new service or feature in a year where customer retention is the stated North Star.
ii) Identify low-ROI work and eliminate pet projects in marketing

Most organizations keep bad ideas alive until they become “in progress,” then “almost done,” then “too late to stop.” That’s how opportunity cost quietly eats your year.

Use a Project ROI and Opportunity Cost Survey (internal teams closest to execution, plus leadership) to quantify returns and prevent resource drain

  • Example questions
  • “Which projects have the clearest ROI in the next two quarters?”
  • “Which initiative consumes the most resources for the least return?”
  • What this helps you stop:
  • Low-ROI activities that consume significant time and human resource.
  • Pet projects: ideas championed without data-driven justification and protected by authority rather than impact.
iii) Separate customer value from customer tolerance (CX)

“No one complained” is not a strategy. It’s often a sign that customers have learned to tolerate friction because switching feels worse.

Use a customer experience survey to find what customers truly value versus what they merely put up with.

  • Example questions
  • “Which parts of the experience feel essential versus merely acceptable?”
  • “If we removed one part of this experience, what would you least miss?”
  • What this helps you stop:
  • Investing in improvements that customers won’t use.
  • Over-optimizing tolerable areas while missing the true value drivers.
iv) Protect what already works and prioritize the vital few (CX/market research)

One of the easiest ways to create a disaster is to “improve” the very thing customers love most.

a) A Feature Feedback Survey can identify the elements customers consider non-negotiable. You could ask something like -

b) Use a Prioritization Survey or a Product Research Survey to help you choose the vital few and confidently ignore the rest. (Pareto's principle). You could ask something like

“If we improved only one thing this quarter, what should it be?”

  • What this helps you stop:
  • Spending on lower-impact features simply because they’re in the pipeline.

2) Operations

Operations is where waste hides in plain sight. The goal here isn’t to “optimize everything" but to find the few operational fixes that smoothens processes.

i) Identify zombie systems and redundant tools

Tool sprawl is one of the most common operational leaks. Licenses renew. Systems persist, and no one admits they’re tolerated rather than useful.

Use a SaaS Adoption Survey to dispose redundant tech

  • Example questions
  • “Which tools do you actively rely on weekly?”
  • “Which tools feel redundant with something else we already have?”
  • What this helps you stop:
  • Paying for licenses no one believes in.
  • Maintaining zombie systems for historical reasons alone.
  • Keeping three tools that do the job of one.
ii) Find bottlenecks in finance and approvals systems

You don’t need a financial overhaul to save money. Sometimes you need to eliminate the few approval loops that stall work.

Use a Process Feedback Survey focused on finance workflows.

  • Example questions
  • “Where do approvals slow execution the most?”
  • “Which step feels like bureaucracy rather than governance?”
  • What this helps you stop:
  • Busywork reporting.
  • Unnecessary approval loops that kill momentum.
iii) Reduce Logistics and delivery friction

Logistics decisions often become habit-based: the same vendors, the same routes, the same assumptions.

Use an Operational Feedback Survey for teams closest to delivery.

  • Example questions
  • “Where do delays most often originate?”
  • “Which part of the delivery chain feels least predictable?”
  • What this helps you stop:
  • Fixing symptoms instead of root causes.
  • Over-investing in low-impact logistics tweaks.

3) Human resources

HR initiatives often come from a good place. But “well-intentioned” doesn’t mean “well-aligned.” If you want fewer wasted programs and stronger culture, you need signals, not assumptions.

i) Avoid generic employee benefits initiatives that nobody asked for

If you want to reduce waste, stop guessing what employees want.

Use an Employee Benefits and Wellbeing Preferences Survey to make inititiaves personalized

  • Example questions
  • “Which wellbeing benefits would you actually use?”
  • “Which benefit feels most valuable right now?”
  • What this helps you stop:
  • Spending budget on perks that look good externally but don’t land internally.
ii) Surface busywork, silos, and protected C-players

This is where surveys become uncomfortable, which is exactly why they matter. Culture problems don’t resolve themselves.

Use a Employee Pulse Survey or an Employee Pulse Survey designed to reveal incentives and friction.

  • Example questions
  • “Is ‘hours worked’ more rewarded here than ‘impact achieved’?” (agree/disagree scale)
  • “Where does information hoarding slow your work?” (single select + optional comment)
  • “Do under-performers get addressed effectively?” (agree/disagree scale)
  • What this helps you stop:
  • Confusing effort with output.
  • Reinforcing norms that demotivate top performers.
  • Protecting C-players for comfort.

Quick tip: Cross-tabbing reports against North Star alignment, or customer preferences against tolerance, exposes where effort looks valuable but isn’t. Using a survey analytical dashboard helps make these gaps visible at a glance.

Conclusion  

If you’re serious about making this year count, don’t just ask what you should do next. Ask what you should stop doing, stop funding, and stop tolerating.

Surveys, used strategically, help you do this without guesswork. They reveal misalignment against your North Star metric, expose opportunity cost and low ROI, identify the vital few and filter out the trivial many. They can surface zombie systems, bottlenecks, and cultural friction that silently drains performance.

This guide is only the tip of the iceberg, but it’s a strong place to start. And the earlier you start, the more of the year you actually get to spend on what matters.

Ask early. Decide better.

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