A Sticky Situation.....
 

Ok, im just gonna start off by saying that this is an anonymous post. All name and places have been changed or omitted. The story is still the same no matter what the names.

Ok, so this is gonna be long, but I really want feed back. I also want to know how you would feel. So please read this and tell me.


So here it goes........

This past year was a good year, we did well at our regional and also at the championship, but it was followed by a lot of troubles. So we have this one mentor that lets just say can lose his cool from time to time, but he isn't a bad person he just has trouble handling the stress. Well, this got some people on our team angry. So they got the administration involved. A right step in my own opinion, but in some cases they over embellished the circumstances a little ok a lot but still. So all the teams mentors had a meeting with the administration and this mentor at our meeting place, and they basically had a bashing party of this one mentor they told him everything they didn’t like about him and he took it like a descent person would. After they he promised to change his ways and work with us to make it better. So everything was all well and good. Then, some of the main leaders of the mutiny got the idea to leave the team and start a new one. Which was fine but this is what I want some feed back on. They did all this without telling this particular mentor who was also the moderator of our team by the way about this. Then about a month ago our moderator received an envelope containing 3 sets of keys, which were the keys of three of the mentors that led this whole thing. And now come to find out today that these members not only started team but convinced a good number of our team members to go to theirs. I personally am staying with the team I am currently on because I know you won’t always like everyone you work with and plus they never even gave the mentor a chance to change his ways. So this year we are down a bunch of members and are at risk of losing our sponsorship because the person who was the liaison to the company sponsoring us was one of the ones who left.

In my opinion I think the whole situation was handled completely immaturely and unfairly because they didn’t even gave the guy a chance.

Now my question to you people is how would you feel about this whole thing and do you have any suggestions to never let it happen again and I hope everyone can learn from our mistake and learn from it.


Thank you so much for your time and attention,
C7First
:(

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

Posting anonymously isn't going to spare anyone's feelings... anyone on your team will immediately recognize the story.

Just forget all that stuff, okay? The team exists to work with whatever resources available to build the best robot they can with those resources (and to actively try to increase those resources). There's no sense in worrying over a situation you can not change.

If anything, try to get the two new teams to work together, and spin this into a positive change.

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

i know i just wanted to be sure....


i know and i know we'll do well it was just the situation and the way it was handled.

Good idea, no way it is gonna happen

and thanks for reading

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

First of all, you ahould try talking to that group of people who left. If that does not work, I'm not sure there is anything you can do. It could be nice if your team held it and found sponsership and all it needs. I'm sure you guys can still be FIRSTers, but if those 2 teams become enemy-like it will not be GP at all, and therefore not with the spirit of FIRST. You should see how it works.
Are those 2 teams gonna be from the same school, or city?
Do you want ti recruit the same members?
If those 2 question have a positive answer than you have a serious problem, and mabe even should contact FIRST.
Hope i helped, Liron.

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

FIRST-A-Holic's-Anonymous Mailbox is a forum in CD that was set up to be able to deal with tough questions/situations, I thought. I'm not sure what happened to it or if we still have that available to us.

Edit: this is a response to Adam's post, sorry I didn't include a quote.

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

we tried talking and it didn't matter. i know that we will find sponsership, we are actively figureing that out. o we will still be in first and we will have a great time. there is no bad blood between us to them i dont know how they feel about us but i will never know for sure. not the same school but prob the same city. and most likelty the the same members and i am looking into options of the course of action to take.

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

Woah. Well, first off, don't look at what happened, because no amount of complaining or discussing can change it. Let's look at what's going to happen. Here's what I'm gathering from your description, please correct me if I've drawn the wrong conclusions: The other mentors split off to their new team without notifying the other mentor, and without giving him any time to change.

Here's what I'd do in this situation. If you're really really concerned about this, ask the mentors to sit down and talk about the issue. However, since it seems like there's a bit of a communication issue, you may want to write up your concerns (in a very polite way, maybe write and then edit it a ton of times, with different people reading it, just to avoid any and all chances of misunderstanding), and just send the written form to all involved parties.

If nothing comes of discussing the issue, I suggest going gung ho on sponsorship gathering and recruitment, and try and build your team to a new level. You and the one mentor left could work together to develop a new team image, name, and to gather new students.

Personally, I'd look at this as an opportunity to start from scratch, and to build a new team, based on a new system. Also, make sure to document any and all changes you make at this time, as all that makes prime Chairman's submission material.

Good luck with the new changes!

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

i didn't know there was even such thing.....

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

Not so sure it has been used in a while, maybe one of the mods could tell us a little bit about it.

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

Why not?

There is no way that so much animosity was created by one mentor that two teams would refuse to work together. This isn't about mentors or their power struggles, this is a program for high school students.

If enough kids with level heads decide it's best if the teams help each other (which is true), and the mentors refuse, tell the mentors to grow up and remind them that this program is for students.

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

the first part is right and it is a small group of people on our team now not just me and the mentor but thanks so much those are all great ideas.

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

im not sure it is worth a try but not knowing how they feel right now. it makes it difficult but it is defenatly a great idea

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

it also not just the mentors in the struggle some of the students had problems with this mentor too.

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

that would be cool

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

This is the link to the FIRST-A-Holics Anonymous forum: http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/fo...play.php?f=124

You can create a thread there that will remain hidden until approved by the folks behind the scenes. When your post appears, it will be stripped of your identifying information.

Remember, it's otherwise against forum rules to maintain more than one account per person.

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

i know that is why as soon as this discussion is over i am deleting this profile.

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

Dealing with the question at hand:

People usually cannot and do not change. This mentor has a good possibility of, in a stressful situation, not maintaining his changed behavior.

The people who gave him a second chance were not playing fair and are IMHO chickens. If they didn't want this person on the team, then just come out and say it. To do otherwise is cowardly.

Way to inspire, too. When things get tough, duck & run.

I don't have a good way to resolve this. I might maintain the original team, and do whatever to keep it afloat. Perhaps I'd join the other team, if they'd have me. Perhaps I'd leave FIRST forever, but not without telling those other mentors in calm, unemotional terms what I thought of their "Graciously Professional" behavior.

Please don't consider leaving FIRST, be the more mature one and learn from this, you'll be a better person forever for it.

Don

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

it isnt that he always has problems and we believed that all people deserved a second chance. i have no intentions of leaving FIRST i spend more hours at first than i do at home but we are trying to work it out but everyone deserves a second chance. and it isnt that we didnt want him he does a lot of stuff for the team he ust had a few deatails that needed changing.

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

i just want to say thank you to you all.

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

I am not so sure that I can agree with this statement. People can and do change. Some for the worse but more for the better. If we did not believe that then why do we try and help anyone. Maybe I am an optimist but I believe that everyone can improve and better themselves. Let's just remember that negative attitudes will breed negative results.

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

i agree completly and that was the main attitude of the team except for the people that branched off.

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

Everyone deserves a second chance, a true second chance to erase all feelings from the past and start anew. To become a better person, and the only way you can do that is by learning from the past.

What those people did to that person made immature choices and showed a bad example. Now that they have left your original team, keep it going, make it off the lessons you have learned here, that everyone deserves a second chance to make up and adjust his wrongs. become the leader and lead this team to become better. You know how most everything is done, how it works, and how to recruit. You can try something new, but whatever you do, teach this new team the lessons that you have learned. And play this out. Who knows, maybe these new teams and the original one could become the most succesful teams in the country because of your team work and the collaborations of many diverse ideas. If team work with the new teams doesn't work out, contact other neighboring teams. If you are in Indiana, contact any team in the state, I know that most will help you and teach you new ideas and designs.

The way it sounds, is that you may be one of the new leaders of your team. Make the best of these new changes. If you need help, any neighboring team for help. Don't give up on the teams that split off from the original team. Make them your friends and don't look at them as if they made a dumb choice. It was their decision to break off, it's yours not to give up.

Good luck with your new team,
Seth Cook

(P.S. If you ever want to try a new type of engineering, give 1501 a call, we can teach you monocoque engineering (unibody, used in planes, cars, the space shuttle, etc.). We are starting some tutorials on it and would be willing to help you out online and the such.)

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

C7First, if you are actually from Atlanta like your anonymous profile indicates feel free to get in touch with me and the local Georgia FIRST committee will do what we can to help. My email is jroberts AT usfirst.org

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

Thank you for your kind words it was a big help. and we will definatly will use your advise.

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

We arn't actually from georgia but i used it cause it is central hub for first but thanks for the offer.

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

This is a wonderful suggestion. It might be helpful to contact a FIRST rep in your area for some help.

There are always 2 sides to each situation and it would be wise to look at both of those objectively and clearly.

Jane

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

Wow. Let me start off by saying that I am / was a member of the team that C7 is talking about.

1. This (mentor) has been a problem for a couple years now.
2. The mentors who left keys gave this person plenty of time for the administration to do something. But since nothing happened, we moved on.
3. Is it wrong to tell him what we don't like about him? The things he did we more immature than that of which you call us.
4. Mutiny? I would hardly call this a mutiny. Does the fact that we're not returning to this team next year make it a mutiny? We all moved on, i suggest you do the same.
5. At no time did we ever 'recruit' members of the other team.

C7, you know who I am, and you know my feeling on the whole matter. Best we all move on from this stupidity.

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

First of all none of you know the whole situation in the matter. You are making yourself look foolish by talking about something you know very little, if anything, about.

C7 won't tell you what his father(oops maybe i shouldn't say that) did as a mentor

yes c7 very well could be the mentors son or a good friend of the mentors son.I really wouldn't be shocked if it's the mentor himself so now take everything he said with a grain of salt.

the story is 95 % incomplete but as a mature adult I will not air our dirty laundry
in this thread.You really cant say how to fix the problem if you were not here to see the problems we had.

as of the word "mutiny" we didn't make him walk the plank,but this is the second "mutiny" in 3 years. So is it us or him?

And lastly nobody made anybody do anything they didn't want to do. Yes we have a large chunk of the mentors but we all came to the same conclusion
( TO BE ON A TEAM JUST NOT THIS ONE)

We always hope them nothing but the best but if this keeps going on who will be the immature child in this manner.Just move on and let it go. We did.

and don't worry about they sponsorship.If they loose it, it will because of the mentor not us. They get plenty of money from the school anyways.

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

Creating anonymous accounts are a violation of the site rules, no matter what their purpose is. This thread doesn't need to be discussed publically; you should deal with inner-team struggles as a team .. not on an open forum.

Re: A Sticky Situation.....
 

Let's all use the above situation as an example of what not to do.

It is never wise to air a team's dirty laundry publicly. What ends up is what we all see here. Even with this teams anonymity in tact (well, from most of us), it still gets messy.

Let's learn from this, move on, and hope that these teams to work through this through their own communication channels as needed.

Andy B.