The monthly outlook survey in industry is part of the harmonised European Union programme of business and consumer surveys to which the 28 Member States of the European Union contribute.

Thus questionnaires, classifications and data processing methods have been harmonised to a large extent in the national institutes of the countries that have adopted this system.

Questions are formulated so that they can be answered quickly (most of the questions are qualitative with three response options expressed in the form "higher, lower, stable", or "more than normal, normal, less than normal").