Everywhere I go, nowadays, people want my opinion. At least, they say they do.
“Would you be willing to take a brief opinion survey?” they ask me. “It’s only a few minutes of your time, and your feedback would be invaluable in helping us improve your consumer experience in the future.”
I always start out flattered. “Oooh! They want my opinion. I am an opinion-maker!”
And so I begin, attempting to be generous but fair regarding the product, store, service, or magazine in question. “On a scale of 1 to 10, where 10 is ‘Completely Satisfactory’ and 1 is ‘Horrendous,’ how would you rate our product? Our service? Our return address? Our hair?”
But five or six questions in, it stops being fun.
They go on and on, asking you to choose between 10 degrees of variation on things you had never even noticed: “On a scale of 1 to 10, how would you evaluate the color of ink used on the border of our cover illustration?” There may be 50 shades of gray, but I have trouble finding ten different notches between Completely Satisfactory and Completely Un.
Isn’t it enough that I thought they were Pretty Good? After all, I bought them, didn’t I?
In any case, all I usually want to say is that either the service or product was very good, or very bad. Sometimes I want to add something they hadn’t asked me. Like, “I love my doctor, but we both feel so rushed I don’t remember my most important questions till I’m out the door.” But there’s no 10-point scale for that.
They never let you give real answers, like: “I consider your website a reliable source of cheap junk that can be counted on to break down the day after the warranty expires,” or “Your produce used to be terrific but lately it’s been spoiling too soon,” or “I avoid your shopping center like the plague because I can’t afford the body-work I need on my car after every time I’ve parked there.”
They also don’t bother to tell you that unless you grade everything with the highest marks, some hapless employees are going to suffer:
“My experience at the We’ve-Got-It-All outlet was 10) Perfection Itself; 9-through-1) Heads Will Roll.”
Come to think of it, that’s probably why I had someone argue back with me, the other day. “A nine? You give our service a nine? Why not a ten?”
“Um, sure, I meant 10.”
It would all be so much easier if they had gradations that corresponded to my life:
“Which of the following most closely describes your experience with our Software Tutorial: a) more fun than Disney World; b) more fun than shoe shopping; c) more fun than bathing suit shopping; d) more fun than a root canal; e) give me the root canal.”
But of course, they don’t offer options like that because they only want certain information, as far as your feedback is concerned.
Well, two can play at that game.
When Judy Epstein walked in to your branch office this morning, you were overcome with her
a)beauty
b)cheerful attitude
c)insightful questions
d)cologne.
On a scale from 1 to 10, the new PSEG-LI “Reliability Project” along Northern Boulevard is
1)Reliably creating traffic nightmares
5) An outstanding achievement in Uglification where tree trimming is concerned
10) And the poles are hideous, too.
Dinner tonight was:
1) Fabulous
2) Delicious
3) More please!
4) I don’t know how you do it.
The laundry that gets done here every week is
1)Miraculous
2)Delightful
3)One of the joys of life
4)Did you switch detergents? It’s better than ever!
5)Something I too often take for granted.
If we ever win a pile of money, we will use it to improve:
a)the kitchen
b)the garden
c)the windows
d)the plumbing
e)all of the above
On a scale of 1 to 10, where 10 is “astoundingly beautiful” and one is “I look fat in this dress,” how do I look? 10) Perfection Itself; 9-through-1) Heads Will Roll.
On a scale from 1 to 10, the planning that goes into our social calendar is 1) Completely Satisfactory; 2) Completely Satisfactory; 3) Completely Satisfactory; 4) Need I go on?
The state of organization of important papers around this house is:
Well, you can’t have everything.
