Quarterly Reports

[jonejam2]

Again - Thank you. The QR was fairly easy to do once everyone understood what the handbook calls for. The last month of the quarter is where most of the data is derived. Its easy when the CHI spells it out so clearly.

[nutterb]

Statistically*, the quarterly report is what is known as a 'systematic sample.' Systematic samples have their strengths and weaknesses, but in the mindset of observing and monitoring monthly church activity, it really is the most appropriate sample to use.

Normally we like to see random samples. However, there are two factors in monthly church activity that are problematic to random sampling. 1) There is strong suspicion of a seasonal effect, and 2) there are only 12 months in a year. Combine these two factors, and a random sample is too likely to produce a cluster of months near each other that would fail to capture the seasonal effect of church attendance. Organizationally speaking, communication of which months to report becomes a problem.

Whether or not reporting on the quarter or reporting on the last month is more appropriate is a matter of the purpose of the report. If the purpose of the report is to represent quarterly activity, then it should be reported on the quarter. Since the handbooks state that the purpose is to report on monthly activity, it would be inappropriate to report on anything but monthly activity.

So what it boils down to is that the quarterly report is a systematic sample of the monthly reports the wards quorums, groups, and auxiliaries should be producing on a monthly basis anyway. In my personal opinion, if you are putting any emphasis on the quarterly report but not bothering to collect that information on a monthly basis, you're doing something wrong.** The only information of importance on the monthly (and quarterly) reports are the names--more specifically, the people those names represent. The quarterly report, when boiled down to the statistics, is of little value by itself.


* Just in the interest of credentials, I'll point out that I am a statistician by trade.

**Full disclosure: in my ward, we don't collect this information monthly, which is something that bothers me a little and I'm starting to take steps to repair. At the same time, I allow very little discussion about the quarterly report because we don't bother to look at it monthly.

[russellhltn]

In my personal opinion, if you are putting any emphasis on the quarterly report but not bothering to collect that information on a monthly basis, you're doing something wrong.**

As an old-timer, there was a time when that report was generated and submitted monthly. That meant that all the work of the current quarterly report had to be repeated every 4 Sundays. Then it was cut back to the current "last month of the quarter".

I can only speculate that it was free up some "leadership CPU cycles" for actual ministering to the members.

[nutterb]

As an old-timer, there was a time when that report was generated and submitted monthly. That meant that all the work of the current quarterly report had to be repeated every 4 Sundays. Then it was cut back to the current "last month of the quarter".

I can only speculate that it was free up some "leadership CPU cycles" for actual ministering to the members.

I understand and agree that these reports shouldn't take away from the ministrations. I'll point out that by my own opinion, I'm not really getting any worth out of my quarterly reports because I'm not gathering the information on a monthly basis. And I'm not gathering the information for the very reasons you point out. I'm playing with some ideas to try and correct this, but I don't know yet how successful it would be or if my bishopric would be willing to experiment in this arena. If I do find a good way to do it, however, I'll be sure to let you know.

Ideally, I'd like to see this wrapped up into the online tools to where a secretary can go in once a month and select the names of the people in their organization that did not attend/were not visited. Seems like this could be a ten minute monthly job that could then populate a report pretty easily. I might try something like this in MS Access, but that still bottlenecks the information around either myself or the ward's computer.

[rbitter]

Seasonal reasons for units being penalized in budget allowance are very common outside of Utah or other high-LDS concentration areas (ie, AZ, CA, NV, ID). This is because many of us who leave "Zion" and go out into the world often return and visit Utah homes during holiday seasons (such as June-July 4 vacation weeks and during the December Christmas season). This has always been my experience in three different outlying states - we are always penalized in budget allowance by using the last month of the quarter when members are traveling and attendance is significantly reduced. The budget allowance never "equals out." Just saying...

[TinMan]

Wow. Good thing people in "Zion" don't take vacations in June-July 4 to places like Disneyland or Yellowstone. Or go visit their Grandchildren over Christmas in Arizona where it is warmer...