Re: Post-Season Individual Awards for Team Members
 

I lead engine deveopment teams in my role at Rolls-Royce, and spend a lot of my time learning and understanding team dynamics and how to create high performing teams. Recognition of exceptional performance is one of the ways to create such teams.

There is always a callenge in determining how to recognize exceptional performance of team members and the team as a whole. There are no set 'rules', but here is how i have worked this for the past 4 or 5 years.

There are team goals and objectives and major milestones that must be met. It will usually take effforts from a wide range of people to achieve these objecives. When the major ones are hit on target, then we recignize the entire team with a catered lunch, an outing, or sometimes just an public announcement of the achievement.

There are also individuals who stretch "above and beyond" when helping the team achieve these goals. My experience is that it takes several high performing individuals to create a high performing team. We always take time to also recognize these individuals for exceptional performance with small awards, gift cards, dinner out or some small gift.

It takes work to manage an effective reward system, but recognition at both an individual level and a team level is critical for ongoing, continued success in most organizations.

Re: Post-Season Individual Awards for Team Members
 

We don't give out individual awards, mainly because we fear celebrating one person more than another.
Certain people who deserve awards are typically awarded by experience or "popularity" on the team.

Re: Post-Season Individual Awards for Team Members
 

At our end of year banquet, the students usually do something to show their appreciation to the mentors. This year it was gift cards, in the past it was more of a gag gift. We also have an award named after a former team member who was very inspirational to the team. We consider it our "Chairman's Award", as it is the highest award that we can give to a student. The mentors decide who is the Senior who has contributed the most to the team during his/her entire tenure with the team. Last year we had so many students that were deserving, the choice was very hard, so we started a "Mentors Award". It is similar to the "Judges Award" in that if we find a student that deserves recognition, but the student did not get other recognition, we give that student a "Mentor's Award".

Re: Post-Season Individual Awards for Team Members
 

On 177 the last few years the students have come up with humorous awards to "roast" the mentors at our end of season potluck dinner. I wish I could remember what even half of them were, but the one currently on my desk is the "30 lb Laptop Award". I got that for complaining all season having to lug my portable workstation around so the engineers had Pro/E. (None of us knew inventor last year)

Re: Post-Season Individual Awards for Team Members
 

We've had dinners for the past two years, but we honor our sponsors and mentors there, not members of the team. It's also a time to discuss what we're thinking about for the coming year, and to show what we've accomplished to people who couldn't make the competition.

Re: Post-Season Individual Awards for Team Members
 

Every year we have a picnic... and at this picnic the participation medals are turned into individual joke awards. There is no set thing that continues year to year... it's based on each season.

Awards of Two Years Ago:

Sparky Award - Excellence in Electronics
Golden Apron Award - For Mascot/Spirit
MVP - Most Versatile Pioneer - Designing, Building, Strategizing, Dancing
Ambassador Award - Forging bonds with other teams
Branch Rickey Award - Excellence in Scouting
Filet Mignon Award - Great when you have it, but it’s not too often
Typhoid Mary Award -Outstanding efficiency in infecting Pioneers at Palmetto
Spider Man Award - Excellence in Webmastery
Upper Class Rookie of the Year - Felix Unger Award
Cleanest Pit and work area
Team Scapegoat Award
Mr. Goodwrench Award
Gimme a hand and lift this award
Rookie of the Year (Freshman)
Pasta Chef Award - Excellence in Spaghetti-Bowl wiring
Tricycle Award - “We don’t need no stinkin’ four wheels!”
Upper Class Rookie of the Year
Napster Award - For anything and everything with computers
Pale Skin Award - Achievement in Computer Programming
Build Season Dinner Glutton Award
Michelangelo Award
Speling Bee A warrd

I do not have last year's list on me, but there were some such as:

Screen Door on a Submarine Award
Volume Award - volume of work and voice

I can't recall... there were a bunch more. Our coaches make them personal... so they change from season to season.

Re: Post-Season Individual Awards for Team Members
 

The seniors all get gag gifts. We give varsity letters to those who have clearly demonstrated their commitment to the team. We also give out indivual awards for the following: Team Spirit, Most Improved, Rising Star, Most Valuble Rookie, Commited to a Concept, Best Program Support (typically goes to a mentor, parent, or sponsor), Most Techincally Proficent, Special Recongition (this person did a get job but doesn't fit under any of the awards and typically goes to someone who isn't involved in the program per-say but is a great team asset, for example janitors who stayed late so we could work longer), Best Team Lead, Engineer's Award, Mentor of the Year and Most Valuable Participant.
However, the ceremony tends to go long so wwe are considering cutting: Most Improved, Commited to a Concept, Best Team Lead and Engineer's Award.

Re: Post-Season Individual Awards for Team Members
 

In previous years team 1726 has awarded individual awards at our banquet. They traditionally consisted of a senior engineering award, a junior engineering award, and a team player award. The first two were awarded by mentors while the last was voted on by the team. This year we did not perform this tradition mainly due to the leaving of the mentor primarily responsible for the awards and cost cutting measures.
I will also note that such awards have real world value. When listing academic awards for my Caltech application I listed my senior engineering award fairly high on the list. On my letter of acceptance was a handwritten comment congratulating me on that specific recognition.

Re: Post-Season Individual Awards for Team Members
 

One of the Mentors gives out two award at our after regional dinner. One is called The Trevor (named after a student who did all our CAD) and Then theres another award, these he gives to two students who stood out this year and really did an amazing job. (Since 2007)

Then we have the "paper plate awards" the subteam leaders gather in my basement and we take paper plates and put each team members name on it and a inside joke/something funny that happend that season for that person and draw a little picture. We make these for all the student and mentors. (Since 2004)

The team also gets a gift to thank the Mentors and Teachers (Since 2002)

This year a student made a new award for our "Team Mom", this year it happens to be my mom...(Since 2008)

so thats pretty much what we do