Thanks for #5, JG!
This is exactly what I needed to hear!
I'm having a conflict with a client and have been going over compositions to an email I have been intending to send. This advice provided some clarity for me.
Rather than sending an email that would be nearly guaranteed to escalate tensions, I'll remember that people do business with people they like.
And though I may loose a client, I wont be the engineer of the asswagon train!
I was thinking about this thread the other day in the context of volunteerism. I used to sit on my neighborhood HOA board. I love my neighborhood and it felt good to do something for the common good, but after a while it just exhausted me. Probably 50% of my neighbors were demanding jerks who treated us like we were being paid to serve them, and refused to contribute anything except grievances and trouble. After I left the board I volunteered to be the guy to take the common area trash for our pool and tennis courts out to the curb every week. Last week I saw one of my neighbors throwing all his personal trash in the common area cans because he had missed the pickup at his own house, so I got to haul all his trash back FROM the curb so I could haul it out again the following week. I decided I'd had enough and posted that I was done, and asked for a volunteer replacement. Not one person stepped up out of 150 houses in the neighborhood. I'm at the point where I'd rather watch the trash pile up than keep doing it. I've worked in sales for many years and there's almost no limit to the amount of crap I'll put up with from a paying customer. As a volunteer? No thanks. It just depresses me how terrible people can be.
Thinking about larger racing orgs- so much of their support is from volunteers. I know many of them and they do it out of genuine love for the sport, but there is definitely a limit to how much crap volunteers will put up with. Combine that with the selfish,entitled attitudes that many members display and you have a recipe for dysfunction. I just wonder if there's any way to rectify this unless the clubs start to pay people fairly for their time, and the members are willing to assume that cost.
ShinnyGroove (Forum Supporter) said:The worst thing about long drivers meetings is that they often go until 3 minutes before the first group needs to be on grid, so most people aren't paying attention at the end anyway. They're looking at their watches.
And then the same organizers that rambled about which end is the front of a cone start rushing everyone it's irritating.
i didn't read this when it was new but i want to push back gently on the "allow flexibility"
for track events that I volunteer at we don't have enough people to keep registration and tech open all day. We try to accommodate people who need to be late but ultimately when registration closes the people doing registration are either participants in the event or move on to some other role in the day (grid, drivers coach, black flag, safety steward, etc.)
while I am appreciate the intent of the article and teams need to be friendly and as accommodating as possible i also want members to recognize that our volunteers can only be in one place at a time.
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