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Doug Bechtel
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OPALCO is ready to undertake our first ever member attitude survey. This survey is largely the result of the board retreat we had in January where we realized that we needed more input from our members before identifying many of OPALCO's objectives for the near and mid term future. For example, how do you feel about us getting involved in areas besides electric, how do you feel about the services we are providing - where do we need to improve?
After a lengthy process (at least to me), we selected a company that does surveys for electric cooperatives all over the country to survey 550 of you, our members. The questionnaire we ended up with has about 70 questions and will provide statistically valid answers. The surveyors have told us that by surveying over 500 of our members, the answers will be accurate to within Ò4%. Based on criteria given to us by the survey company, we randomly selected 400 residential members and 100 commercial members in addition to identifying our 50 largest commercial accounts to participate in the survey.
The bad news is that the survey is being done over the telephone. Everyone has told us that a mail-in survey receives a terrible response and only people who really like or dislike OPALCO will take the time to respond; the telephone survey promises a broader cross section of our members and makes the results statistically valid. Other bad news is that they are going to call in the early evening (sound familiar?) in order to include people who work outside the home.
To revisit the issue of mail-in questionnaires, we recently mailed out a questionnaire to 400 of our members at the request of the Washington Rural Electric Cooperative Association. 47 were returned, which is about the same percentage of return for the ballots in our annual report. Slightly over 10% is not a very large return, but we did get credit for at least having the largest number of respondents of the co-ops who participated. On the other hand, we have given the survey company some extra names to replace those members who choose not to participate in the upcoming member attitude survey. It is really important to us, however, that if you get the call, you spend the time answering the questions to help us determine what we need to do to serve you better in the future.
I am really looking forward to the results of this survey. There are some answers I am kind of afraid to hear because I think I know what you are going to tell me. In other areas, I feel that OPALCO does well, and I am looking forward to reaffirmation of some of the progress we have made over the years.
If you are one of those selected to participate, please take a few minutes to share your thoughts and let the company know what you think we are doing well, areas where you believe we need to improve, and changes you would like to see. The results will be very valuable in helping OPALCO set its goals for the next several years. We should have the results of this survey available to us in October. I look forward to sharing them with you.
Doug Bechtel
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