Refrain from the negatives

[RoboMom]

I think constructive criticism is always welcome. I have said many times that the hardest part of FIRST is communication.

I facilitate our local team forum. I also send out a survey to all who came to the Chesapeake Regional. I have also been cut and pasting comments off the CD forums, taking off identifiers, collating into different subject areas.

I think it's fine to voice an opinion on how things could be better for the majority involved.
There are about 50 people at HQ. There are 45,000 volunteers and 25,000 students involved in FIRST programs. Things can always be better.

[Pat Chen]

Originally Posted by Eugenia Gabrielov

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that I think in some ways, highlighting a "negative aspect" could actually be a helpful situation, but I think I will expand on Arefin's great statement and say this:

Every complaint you write reaches someone's ears, but if you really want to make a difference, you need to change your gripes into suggestions, into statements with reason and suggestion, instead of leaving your audience with basic criticisms sans actual reason behind them.

Eugenia is right. There is a difference between complaints and constructive criticism....complaints are gripes or whining fest whereas constructive criticism coupled with suggestions...allows for the possibility of exchanging ideas which will cause changes .... which will negate the cause of the "complaint" or problem.

Pat Chen

[Rick TYler]

May I just suggest that if you have a constructive criticism to make about FIRST on CD, please make it once and then shut up about it. I get tired of post after post repeating the same argument in slightly different forms. Repeating these things increases the negativity quotient without adding anything new to the dialogue.

[dhitchco]

Speaking of CONSTRUCTIVE criticism for 2007 season, I have yet to see any forward progress in the following areas; we are empowered to make the changes ourselves...not just complain:

1) Who is going to propose changes to the section 7 of the rules to clarify and fix the wording about 'seat saving'?

2) Who is going to propose better rules for robot carts including clarification about safety lights while in motion and about music on the carts?

3) Who is going to propose better rules about fix-it sessions so that those times & dates are "squeaky-clean"

4) Who's going to suggest a new timetable/schedule for the escalators in the GWCC so that it optimizes the up/down traffic flow.....ha, ha, ha....a really big issue isn't it?

I'm sure the list goes, on but this powerful forum can be used to develop positive ideas to steer the ship in new directions next year!

[Rick TYler]

Originally Posted by dhitchco

1) Who is going to propose changes to the section 7 of the rules to clarify and fix the wording about 'seat saving'?

No need to fix the wording -- the teams just need to agree to abide by the rules. Just because there are criminals doesn't mean the law is bad. I don't even believe it should require enforcement. For all the yammering we FIRSTies do about "gracious professionalism" a whole bunch of us are all in favor of violating rules that we think are inconvenient. If we walked the walk like we talk the talk this wouldn't be an issue.