[Aidan F. Browne]

[A little wordy again - sorry - if you want to jump to the gist of this post, skip to the bold text]
I am concerned that I did not get the point across that I intended to in by previous, wordy post. I'm also concerned that some felt I was addressing all posters to the thread -- my bad for not being more specific. I'm am confused though -- I went back and read my post and am not sure exactly where folks are pickup up any of the following:

"People need to forget that FIRST isn't this 'holyer than thou' organization that we can't touch."

"All along, I thought working and thinking relentlessly about how to improve FIRST and the experience it provides displayed passion -- not complacency in accepting the things we're given."

"I think the disconnect is that I don't understand where people have drawn the conclusion that not liking the new system or parts of equates to ungratefulness toward the FIRST staff."

I did say "I have no problem with people discussing their opinions. I have no problem with people making suggestions. I cringe when I hear a bunch of unappreciative whiners telling FIRST what they should do."

I absolutely support open discussion. I have never been a believer in complacency. I have always been a proactive problem solver. I do believe there is lots of room for improvement in a variety of aspects of this or any other organization. I do believe that FIRST wants us to help them improve the organization.

The message I was trying to send (and I'm afraid might not have gotten through) was this:

There is a time and place for constructive criticism. Reactionary criticism (even if it is meant as constructive) is rarely taken that way. Over the past couple of years, this is growing to be a larger and larger problem. I can tell you for a fact [do not ask me to justify it - you just have to trust me here], that there is a feeling among the FIRST staff that they cannot make a move without being flooded by complaints and criticism. That in itself is bad. None of us mean to do that to them, but as a group, that is what we do to them. I am not saying that CD is the only source of that - they get lots of emails and phone calls too - but CD is one of the sources.

They want our input on how to make all the processes better -- they know they need our help in making it better - but they need to get that on their own schedule -- when they ask for it. Or if they don't know to ask for it -- after an appropriate amount of time. Where is their positive feedback about their decisions? Where? I rarely see it. Am I missing it? And please don't tell me that the fact we show up is enough feedback in itself.

Let me summarize this way: what is your own personal ratio of input to FIRST? that is: (criticisms and complaints) to (thanks and support) Hopefully its somewhere near 1:1; 2:1 wouldn't even be horrible. I'm afraid that the average is more like 10:1 or even 100:1.

I'll tell you this -- Woodie's ratio is more like 1:3.