ORIGINAL COMPANY-CONTEXT PRACTICE
Measure a research-site onboarding funnel with incomplete follow-up
Original practice scenario: A hypothetical research-operations team tracks sites from initial contact through document review and activation. Many sites are still in progress. Define a defensible funnel report.
Written for independent practice using company context; this is not a verified question from a company interview.
A REASONED APPROACH
Model answer.
Preserve site cohorts and stage history instead of comparing unrelated monthly stage counts. A site still awaiting review should not automatically be classified as a failed activation.
Work through it
- Identify each site and onboarding episode, recording stage-entry times, reversals and closure reasons while retaining the original event history.
- Build one row per episode with ordered milestone timestamps, validating impossible sequences and handling repeated document reviews without duplicating the episode.
- Report stage conversion and elapsed-time measures for comparable entry cohorts, marking incomplete follow-up and separating withdrawals from ongoing cases.
Tradeoffs to discuss
- Waiting for mature cohorts improves comparison but delays feedback; an operational work-in-progress view remains useful when clearly distinguished.
Common pitfalls
- Do not divide activations this month by contacts this month as though they were the same population.
- Reactivated sites may require a new episode rather than overwriting the outcome of the original one.