jimmyg,
I think good/poor airmanship means different things to different people. It would appear that if someone else has different ideas to you, you would consider them a poor pilot.
It never ceases to amaze me when people fiddle endlessly with v/s, whilst the plane is quite capable of handling it's designed modes. I, personally, would never climb in v/s mode, despite what the fctm says. Would you really want your brand new turbo prop driver playing around in v/s mode at 40 000ft
Also, for small altitude changes(1000ft) and in the hold, the Airbus will descend automatically at 1000ft/min. Click and push......it's that simple.
Furthemore, in v/s, you are losing control of the speed(you will agree that we almost always have a speed restriction in the descent). Why increase your workload by having to mess around with rod and/or speedbrake to keep it under control.
I use the system the way it was designed. Program the box to do what you want and let the plane take care of it. Intervene when things don't go your way. In this proces, rod of 600 - 3000 ft/min is not one of my big concerns.
Each to their own, I guess.