Last week, the Candidate Liaison Committee (aka the CLC) did something we've never done before: we asked every CAS candidate what they think about a lot of different topics. We sent out the first annual Candidate Survey!
Quick plug: if you're actively working toward an ACAS/FCAS and you haven't taken the survey yet, it'll be available here (https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/D5K8SGM) until July 26. You should take it to make your voice heard, but also, you can enter to win one of five $100 AmEx gift cards at the end.
The survey is a little long (46 questions, should take around 15-20 minutes to complete), but we don't expect every annual survey to ask this many questions going forward. Since this is the first time we're doing this, we have some catching up to do with the current cohort of candidates.
This survey covers topics like:
- The Future Fellows newsletter/blog and communication with the CLC
- The CAS (e.g. Should ACAS's be allowed to vote? What should the CAS be doing on the diversity front? Can you find answers to your questions on the CAS website?)
- Satisfaction with the CAS & the CLC
- The profession generally
- Demographics
We asked these questions to help us with a few goals. First, we'd like to know how best to communicate with candidates. Currently, the main way we do this is through the Future Fellows newsletter and blog but we'd like to make that more of an open dialogue. We're hoping to find out how candidates would like to reach out to us, how they'd like us to reach out to them, and what they're interested in hearing about.
Second, we'd like to understand the varied opinions that the current cohort of candidates has so that we can better represent them to the CAS. We're the people that the CAS turns to when they're interested in an opinion from the candidate perspective, and currently the CLC relies on the candidates on the committee and their own networks to respond. Going forward, we're hoping to have a handle on not just what we and our networks think, but what the broad range of candidates think.
Of course, there are more things candidates have opinions on than just what we asked in the survey. To help us with this goal, we'll be sending out shorter, more targeted surveys throughout the year to candidates who sign up to receive them. We're calling these the Hot Topics Surveys. The first one will go out in August 2019, and the topic will be exams. If you're interested in receiving these surveys, you can sign up here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/8F965GM
Finally, we want to understand the questions that candidates currently have and answer them if we can. Our job is literally to "liaise" with candidates - what better way to do that than by answering questions we've been directly asked? While we can't respond directly to the candidates who asked questions (the survey is anonymous, and we can't see who wrote what) we can respond to questions publicly. Watch Future Fellows for articles addressing these questions.
Candidates: we're excited to hear what you have to say. Your opinions matter to us, and we appreciate the time that you're taking to share them with us by taking the survey.
What questions would you want us to ask in future surveys? Let us know in the comments below!