I never thought the lack of people responding to e-mail or
coming to the meeting was a comment on my own personal
likeableness, or on the sincerity of my efforts. The fleet
is full of great people and great boats, and I've received
many a message that says "Alan you're doing a great job". I
have never felt like people thought I was doing a crummy
job, or was trying to be a jerk about how I was going about
the work.
Here's the problem that made it impossible for me to continue...
If I ask the fleet "What do you WANT in a schedule?"
...and the fleet replies "You're doing a great job, Alan"....well, then I still don't know what the fleet wants in a schedule, do I? I mean, I feel good about the job I'm trying to do, but I can't actually DO it. Do you see? Pats on the back are great, and they feel nice, but they don't give me the tools I need to do the job in the way I set out to do it. The killer was that in the end, nobody actually told me precisely what they wanted in their HDA season. Even when I cut and pasted Greg Byrne's great response to my requst for feedback into an e-mail sand sent it out to the fleet as an example, I got no response from anyone else in the fleet. I got several "you're doing a great job" messages, but that still doesn't tell me what you WANT.
Now, I could have gotten all autocratic about it, and just taken the results of my two web surveys and dictated an HDA schedule to the fleet on the strength of those "you're doing a good job, Alan" e-mails.. I could have done that, but I'm not even going to race the HDA schedule, myself, and it just seemed totally wrong for me to dictate a schedule I'm not even going to participate in. I felt a little better about coming on stronger with the "specials" schedule (which I called "Tour" to my regret as it confused everyone) because I was planning to actually do those races. But the HDA schedule? Nope. I won't do it.
The killer is that I could never get specific instructions from anyone but Greg Byrne on precisely what they wanted in their HDA schedule. Well, if I won't dictate, and if the fleet won't tell me, then I have nothing to work with. If I have nothing to work with, then my efforts have amounted to naught, and it's time to step aside. I'm not overjoyed, because it was a lot of work, but I'm not distraught, either. I slept just fine, last night...;)
On Sat, 27 Oct 2001 21:00:16 -0700
Jeannette Lakness-King <tartanj@earthlink.net> wrote:
> Alan Hebert wrote:
> >
> > A few people DID give me *specific* suggestions about
> what
> > they wanted in their season....about three of you.
> >
> > Specific means "I want a race in June on the Cityfront"
> or
> > "I'm not happy because your proposed schedule is too
> heavy
> > on buoy races, and we need more point-to-point races,
> like
> > the second race in the SHO"...or whatever it was that
> you
> > told me.
> >
> > Those three of you know who you are, and for your
> *specific*
> > input, I thank you.
> >
> > Also, the response to my first web-form was absolutely
> > fantastic, and I think the fleet for that, as well. It
> was
> > the first step of the three-four steps we needed to
> take,
> > and even though steps two and three fell apart, the
> first
> > one was very gratifying.
> >
> > Alan
>
> Sir,
>
> My sincere apologies.
> What with drinking and stuff, I FORGOT!
> Definately not an intentional slight to all your
> enormous effort.
>
> -Henry King
>
Received on Sun Oct 28 10:42:03 2001