After a couple of days to think this over I am ready to offer my views of recent goings on at BeestonCC, perhaps this would be best done privately but seeing as it seems to be the done thing to air your views and slate the committee and its members in public I shall make my comments here.
Recently our club website had to take a change of direction due to the fact that the chap looking after it had heavy work commitments, fair play! He had done a great job with the site despite offering great improvements without actually delivering them. I for one am very appreciative of the work he did do though, not my cup of tea but it served the club well.
As mentioned we needed to create a new web home for the club for the above reasons, as far as I and the rest of the committee were concerned we needed to move quickly, so I offered a temporary solution , a new website with a forum attached to it. As far as the forum/blog debate goes I think the club is split 50/50 on that matter. Now I have professed to be a web designer and the remainder of the committee were well aware of this.
Our new sites life started very suddenly and abruptly due the url being switched over without notice, I had asked for an agreed time scale and switch over time so the change over could be better planned, but as it was I receive a phone call at work saying what's happened to the website? I'm stuck at work not being able to do a thing about it.
After a week or two we receive constructive criticism from a member which we took on board and considered what had been said with future improvements in mind. Before these improvements are made I need to know what the club members want from the blog so on numerous occasions I have asked for comments, especially from one sector of the club who seem reluctant to use the forums, from this select group of members I have heard nothing, how can I help if there is no feedback?
Then I hear that the chap who pulled out of running the website (and also resigned from the clubs committee last year) has made a public blog post openly criticising the clubs web site and forum and seemingly drumming up support for his case to take over the management of the site again. Now this is fine by me if he wants it back, saves me the hassle to be quite honest. What is not fine is the way he has done it.
This should be a matter for the club's committee to deal with, he should have approached another committee member rather than throwing it in the open, as it stands I don't even think he has officially approached the clubs committee.
This is a man who founded the club along with two other chaps, and I am so glad they did and must thank him for his part in that, he also served on the committee for a year. He then resigned from the committee, surely at this point he relinquished any right he had to say how the club is ran, this is why clubs have committee's, otherwise we would constantly find ourselves in the situation we have now. I have genuine fears that this could split the club, if it does then at least I can hold my head high in the knowledge that I did my best for the club and I was not the one to create what could ultimately prove to be a divisive situation.
I was hoping in the cold light of day I may have received an apology for the fact that the blame for what he thinks is damaging the club was laid firmly on my doorstep, it was stated that he "stood back whilst I threw all his hard work away". One... You stood back, hence giving up any right you have to manage the club. Two.... I personally have thrown nothing away.
This whole episode has caused me come to the decision to resign from the committee when my term is over, I would like to continue to help the club by staying on as a non exec Membership Secretary and helping look after the web side of things if the committee wants me to.
I don't need this hassle, and it's only my love for the club that is stopping me pulling the plug on the website without notice (well it wouldn't be the first time that's happened hey) and resigning from the committee with immediate effect. I stood for 12 months though, I am a man of my word and would like to serve those 12 months.
These are just my personal thoughts and should be taken as anything more than that.
Liam, I hope this blows over soon. There seem to be issues like this regularly in clubs but often some face to face time sorts it out. Online and faceless is a tricky medium to show your feelings accurately. I truly hope this blows over as I do think you have done a great job. Perhaps the change was too sudden for everyone to get their heads around it but as you say that is not your fault. I am now getting used to the site and the changes you have just made I think really help.
ReplyDeleteHi Guy, your absolutely right, this should be sorted personally rather than posts on blogs etc. My point is that the way things have been done is not right, not actually what is being done, we all have a right to an opinion after all.
ReplyDeleteHad the person in question directly approached myself I'm quite sure I'm big enough to accept the comments and see what can be done to alleviate his concerns. I don't like the way that the comments and thoughts were put on a website for all to see without first approaching myself or the committee. And then to start asking for help before the proposal has even been considered just topped it for me. That was before the personal insult.
Any way old ground and all that, looking forward, thanks for your positive comments Guy, we are already making changes to what we have (which was always the plan).