What if field service reporting were done anonymously?

by eyeslice 14 Replies latest jw friends

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  NewYork44M

  The point that you have brought up is a core issue. There are valid reasons why the society is interested in the number of field service hours and literature placed. These reasons include measuring the effectiveness of the activity and determining production levels of literature. In this case the society would be better off to allow anonymous reporting because this is the only way to get full honesty.

  However these valid reasons go away when the society uses "turning in your time" as a coercive tool to manage the r&f. As a coercive tool the society has created a whole culture where the r&f learn to manage their time to keep the elders off their back.
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  eyeslice

  The reason I raised this topic is that I am currently fading and the elders are after me. Many of these guys have been my friends and I know that they believe they have my best interests at heart.
  
  Also, my wife has spoken to me about whether I believe the witness have the truth. Without giving a direct answer, I have said that I would have to question whether Christ today would choose to be one of Jehovah's Witnesses. Now whatever you belive Christ to be, mere man, saviour or God on earth, he certainly was a rebel against the establishment of his time. There is no way I can see Christ asking his disciples to write down the hours they spent going round the country preaching!
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  El blanko

  I was always puzzled how "hours in field ministry" had any correlation to how loving or how Christian a person is. Using that statistic to judge a person is like judging a car's performance merely by looking at the speedometer, rather than by all factors (handling, brakes, overall condition, etc.)

  That is a very good point indeed !
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  El blanko

  The reason I raised this topic is that I am currently fading and the elders are after me.

  I know of (through a friend) one of Jehovah's Witnesses in a local congregation who did not put hours in at all and never went out in the ministry and when approached by the Elders he simply asked them to show him in the pages of the Bible where it said that a practising Christian "has to" go door to door in the ministry. Then, where does it say that you "have to" record hours and submit them. Of course he initially towed the line, but after a while the whole ministry process did not sit right with his conscience.

  He was marked as being a weirdo and avoided, but he kept attending the meetings and apparently was a very kind and loving man to associate with if one dared to.

  Strange eh
• 

  jws

  How are they now going to know who the inactive ones are.

  Well, they could have a checkbox for everyone's name. Check your name when you put in your timeslip. That way they know you put in a slip, just not who did what. It would service their goal of measuring the work (to the extent that they are accurate) and let them follow up with people.

  Might make some people more dishonest in that nobody can come question who turned in 5,000 hours in one month. And other people who might be inflating hours might be more comfortable telling the truth about how much time they actually put in.