A group of business leaders appointed by the Guilford County Board of Commissioners spent a year looking for ways to improve governmental efficiency. Then they made recommendations and hired a consultant at $370,000 to find ways save at least $4.5 million annually.The commissioners, in a 4-3 vote, turned down the suggestion from the Commission on Excellence at a recent meeting.

``It is extremely disappointing to work as long and as hard as we have and have your suggestions tabled,' commission chairman Warren Corgan said Tuesday.

The Republican commissioners who voted down the recommendation said they want to try things their way, and maybe consider the panel's ideas later.

Republican commissioner Dean Dull, who is vice president of the panel, suggested that the commissioners keep the panel although they refused its recommendation.

But Corgan says that commissioners ought to work with the panel or get rid of it.

``If the county commissioners are going to have a Commission on Excellence, they ought to work hand in hand with the commission, and not develop a confrontational kind of relationship with the commission,' Corgan said. A Republican, he was one of seven businessmen appointed to the panel by the 1990 Board of Commissioners.

``If the commissioners can't see their way clear to operate that way, then I don't think they ought to have one - unless they're looking for a group of yes men, which we certainly were not.'