Well...
 

With only about 10 team members, and this being my first year with FIRST, and my team, I don't know how our team is supposed to be run. On paper, it's set up like a business, with a table, and certain people with different "jobs". I've got 2, and that's Chief Engineering, and Electrical. Sometimes I'm told to do much more, like programming of "EDUbot" as we call it, but I don't understand PBASIC a bit.

Whether we'll get more members is anyone's guess, but I hope we do soon, since I can't handle all of this work!

I am very interested in getting help on this matter. We are a very new rookie team. We had our very first meeting last night. I wasn't sure how many team members we were going to get. With the shortened time period, and not having anything tangible like a previous robot to show, we were facing a challenge of getting the word out. Well, over 60 people showed up. I'm still talleying the team list, but it looks like over 80 have expressed an interest in our FIRST team. We have 38 high school students, 7 university students, 33 industry mentors and parents, and 3 educators. I was hoping to grow the program into this size over the next few years. With it starting out this big, it will present a huge organizational challenge. Did anyone else start big like this? It seems that a business structure would be the best to handle this situation. The family mode sounds good for the working subteams, but coordination of people's schedules and tasks seems to fit better in the business mode.

I'm really very encouraged and thrilled that we have stirred up so much interest. FIRST is definitely filling a need in our community. This is a better problem to have than too few, so I'm definitely not complaining. The most important goal we have this year is to do our best, learn a ton, and have it be the best thing anyone has been involved with. Poor organization can kill this goal by getting people frustrated and not working efficiently and effectively.

The first thing to do is assign leadership roles. You absolutely must have a person in overall charge. They don't have to DO anything, at least not if they can get somebody else to do it. Their job is making sure that everyone else is doing what they are supposed to, and that everything is covered. They also need to be the guiding light for policy decisions.

You need a technical lead. This person makes the final decision on design and implementation matters. ie if you can't decide between two types of gripper, this is the person that makes the call. Let your technical lead organize the build stuff as he or she sees fit. We beak it down into Vehicle, Manipulator, Electrical, Programming and Systems.

The next most important person is the administrator. Most real engineers are lousy at this, otherwise they would be managers. But you need somebody to make sure all of the travel arrangements and "other stuff" like meals during build or whatever gets taken care of.

But really the most important thing is attitude. YOU MUST WORK TOGETHER. We have a rule on our team, once a decision is made, we don't revisit it or second guess. We do put a lot of care into making important decisions, but better to take an extra day or two than to go for three weeks down the wrong path.

Sometimes educators believe ideas are precious, and that every idea should be developed especially if the self-esteem of a student who came up with the idea is percived to be at risk. Engineers only tend to regard ideas that are practical and further the project as precious. This has been known to lead to conflict within the team. Indeed engineers often get passionate about the "right" way to do something.

It is important that these things be managed well. Maybe a student comes up with a great idea on how to accomplish a task, but it is build week 5 and implementing it will cause you to undo everything you've done since week 3 and take until week 8 to finish. Sorry, there is no week 8, better to stay with what you have. Most people will be OK with this if it is explained properly. No reason you can't try it out in the off-season if they are really adamant about trying it.

If you can manage the inevitable conflicts by saying "We are a team. We will get through this. We will do it together". Then you will have a great team no matter what and people will come back for more. If not, then you will probably wind up as at least a couple of teams, or worse half a team. While FIRST really wants us to expand the number of teams, I don't think doing it by spliting existing teams is what they have in mind.

To quote Mrs Chalsma (Team 362, the Muses)

"There is no I in TEAM"

Keep this in mind, treat one another graciously, always assume people are doing their best (even when they fail miserably), and you will find that things kind of come together on their own. The trick will be managing the adults, the kids will pretty much follow them.

At least that's been our experience,

I just downloaded a white paper waiting approval of suggested sub-teams.

ohhh...so true.

We run like a family business--

There are about 10 different subgroups to the student team which essentially report to me. I have several college age members who are my right hands and who help keep the younger kids on task. Our engineering group is also a separate team organized on their own and interacting with the student group. Engineers take precedence over school on the construction aspects. School takes precedence on the PR and gaming aspects

The TEAM aspect took us a while to work out. Everybody works on something and is responsible for a part of the whole. We have 48 kids on varsity roster now and that will be culled down to 30 by the time the regionals come up. Generally I place the kids where they end up based on my observations of them at work during the season and off season. For example-many say they want to be drivers but few work to earn the position. Considering that the fate of a $30K project can rest on the decisions of one student I make very sure that we look over the candidates carefully. There is also some hierarchy by age, but kids who are helpful, responsible and committed rapidly move up despite their age.

But team 25 considers itself a family on all levels. We have a lot of fun and we have our differences. Our BMS engineers are like big brothers to the kids and we all have a great time together. Our parents are also involved and taking more responsibility in team operations than ever. And I get mad at some kids and let them know that too!!

check out http://www.geocities.com/raiderrobot...boPhotos1.html for a breakdown of team operations in 2001- it might be of interest

WC

Something I still don't know about the team I want to be on.

It sucks when you have to sell a house before you can move to a brand new one you already own :(

My team is about 32 students + 5 teachers + 5 former students acting as mentors.
We have two overall leaders who manage the team, the money, sponsors, mentors, etc. We have a leader of the engineering section(me) and a leader of the media section. We also have a small PR section.
Engineering (design and build everything)
1 leader (me)
2 assitant leaders (fill in when I'm away, greater responsibilities)
12 regular members
2 CADers
Media (web page + logo)
1 leader
6 members
Public Relations (banners, posters, fundraising, press releases)
1 leader
5 members
Our team has a definite hierarchy but is very friendly and almost family like.
Overall leaders- Mom and Dad (I won't assign which =)
Heading leaders- Uncles and Aunts
Mentors- Family councilors
Teachers- Grandparents- They help out and supervise but let us do the work.
Regular members- The kiddies

We have big fights like a family no one intervenes, but the people involved just work it out themselves. Plus I don't think we could be reserved or business like....just not in our team's nature...