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Questions in a survey have different numbers of answer options: sometimes 4, sometimes 5, 7 or 8. So that you can still compare their results side by side, Honestly converts every answer into a score between 0 and 100 %. The numbers in your dashboard and the colors of the heatmap are built from these scores.

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How does an answer become a score?

Every answer is spread evenly across the range from 0 to 100 %:
  • The worst answer option of a question always scores 0 %.
  • The best answer option always scores 100 %.
  • The answer options in between are evenly spaced.
As a formula: Score = (answer − worst answer) ÷ (best answer − worst answer) × 100 For star ratings, 1 star is 0 % and 5 stars are 100 %.

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Why doesn’t the number of answer options matter?

The two ends are always the same, 0 % and 100 %. The number of answer options only changes the size of the steps in between:
  • 4 answer options: 0 / 33 / 67 / 100 %
  • 5 answer options: 0 / 25 / 50 / 75 / 100 %
  • 7 answer options: 0 / 17 / 33 / 50 / 67 / 83 / 100 %
  • 8 answer options: 0 / 14 / 29 / 43 / 57 / 71 / 86 / 100 %
The best answer is worth 100 % on every question and the worst 0 %. That is why you can compare a question with 4 answer options directly with a question with 7 answer options in the same heatmap.
With an even number of answer options (4, 6 or 8) there is no true middle: no answer scores exactly 50 %, and every single answer sits clearly on the positive or the negative side. In a heatmap, such questions can therefore swing a little further than questions with an odd number of answer options.

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How is the value of a heatmap cell calculated?

In a heatmap, each row is a question and each column is a group, for example a department. The value of a cell is the plain average of all individual answer scores that people from this group gave to this question. An example for a question with 4 answer options and 10 answers in one department:
  • 4 × best answer = 4 × 100 %
  • 4 × second-best answer = 4 × 67 %
  • 2 × second-worst answer = 2 × 33 %
That gives (400 + 267 + 67) ÷ 10 = 73 %. If you show several questions in one heatmap, the Average row combines each group across all questions. Every single answer counts the same, so a question with more answers carries more weight.

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What color does a cell get?

The color is a continuous gradient without thresholds:
  • 0 % is red.
  • 50 % is yellow.
  • 100 % is green.
Every value in between gets a blended shade; 75 %, for example, sits exactly halfway between yellow and green. There is no value at which a cell becomes “officially green”. The color is absolute, not relative. The same score has the same color in every heatmap and every dashboard, no matter how well or badly the other cells do. A heatmap in which every value lies between 70 and 85 % is therefore yellow-green throughout, not artificially stretched from red to green.

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Why is a cell gray or a column missing?

A gray cell has no value. Usually this is because of the anonymity threshold: if too few people in this group answered the question, no result is shown. A cell is also gray if nobody in the group answered this question. If a group does not reach the threshold at all, it does not appear as a column in the first place. Find out more in How is the anonymity at Honestly ensured?.

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Special cases

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NPS

Questions on the Net Promoter Score are not converted into percentages:
  • 0 to 6 counts as −100
  • 7 and 8 count as 0
  • 9 and 10 count as +100
The value therefore lies between −100 and +100. The colors follow the same logic on this scale: −100 is red, 0 is yellow and +100 is green.

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Top 2

If you choose Top 2 instead of Average under Select the calculation type in the chart editor, each answer counts either as 100 % (one of the two best answer options; for stars, 4 or 5 stars) or as 0 %. The value of a cell is then the share of answers that fall on the two best answer options.

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Your own scale instead of percentages

Under Settings → Results display or in the dashboard settings, you can show averages on your own scale instead of as percentages, for example 1–5. This only changes the number shown, not the color: both are the same even conversion. 3.0 on a scale from 1 to 5 is therefore the same yellow as 50 %. How to switch the display is explained in Display Means in Dashboards.