TRJ Weblog

Have not made an entry in a while. I have run across many topics I considered writing about, but started to realize that every single one of them involved some gripe I have about that topic. I'm hoping that my blog will be more than just a forum for me to vent about something I don't like, so I decided to wait until I could think of something to write about that was not totally negative. I have come to the conclusion that I must enjoy complaining a lot more than complimenting!

I completed the Power of Sun Survey and the Management Excellence Survey this week. I think it is best to do these surveys at a time when you are feeling pretty neutral overall and maybe at a time when you really had not planned on doing the survey. I was just going through my mail box and saw the note about the survey and just decided on the spur of the moment to go ahead and take it. I go back and forth on the surveys. Sometimes I think they can be really useful and sometimes I think they are just window dressing and a waste of time. Sun seems to be going more towards fewer fill in the bubble questions and more for filling in comments or context around your bubble answers. I think this is a good thing and kind of like the way that the requests for comments appears to depend on how you answered particular questions. In some ways they are calling your bluff. Let's say you answered a question like, "Would you recommend Sun" as "unlikely". In the old surveys you might have a place to make open ended comments at the end of the survey. Now, you are more likely to go to the next page to find a question like: Explain why your are unlikely to recommend Sun. Now you have to think or punt. Do I really feel that way? Why? Now that I know I should explain myself, maybe that really should not have been my original answer. Or, you might end up writing a novel about what you think is wrong with Sun. Either way, I think this is more helpful to Sun then just counting the number of bubbles filled in for questions and drawing conclusions from those alone.

My 14 year old daughter told me about surveys they give them at school. Some of them ask questions about whether or not they use drugs. She tells me that a lot of the kids don't take these very seriously and purposely put down answers that are far from the truth. She said one amusing question was at the end of a survey: "I have been truthful with my answers to this survey" True or False. She wonders who would fill out the survey making up answers then admit they were not being truthful with their answers? Having comments or context around certain questions can help determine how seriously someone is taking a survey. If I were to say I was unlikely to recommend Sun, and when asked why, left the comment blank, that could be telling. If I wrote a comment like, I would not recommend Sun because I don't like Jonathan's pony tail, that would also be telling. Telling someone that maybe I'm not taking the survey seriously or I have some serious hair issues. The latter might be closer to the truth. I'm jealous that Jonathan has enough hair to turn into a pony tail and I don't. :-(

In any case, I thought both the Power of Sun and Management Excellence surveys were worth taking. If you have anything to complain about Sun or if you want to say something nice, I would recommend participating in these surveys.