DesirousofChange
I'd say standards were lowered about 9 years ago, in that you diddn't have to excel at anything in particular (like pioneering). But there's also been a resistance to cede ground on a couple keys "standards". Namely: Field service hours have to be at the same level as the congregation average, and meeting attendance has to be better than average.
Similar to what you said, whatever is bad optics cannot be overlooked by the BOE. It just drags down the numbers of the rest of the dubs.
I'm pretty sure that the overworked and drained dubs would love to point to slacking MS and elders to justify their wanting (a very deserved IMHO) some down-time. While the self-righteous overly zealous dubs would love to look down on and criticize on the slacking servants.