Quote:
Originally posted by Sean
All i have to say is that my definition of gracious professionalism is different and i don't think it has such a broad definition. Also if it does have a broad definition than Woodie and Dean named their "catch phrase" incorrectly.
Also companies have a vested interest in supporting programs such as FIRST. If they don't support these programs then the students, their future workforce, wont have the skills necessary and the innovation necessary to help develop and formulate strong designs and ideas that would make a profit for the company.
Also I'm using GP as it pertains to the Science and Engineering Fields not reality or other forms of retail. In Science and engineering the best/fastest/cheapest design/product wins. You are not going to help your competition with their product its not in your interest. So thats why I think GP is Utopian If GP is not in your best interest in the real world companies wont use it and sometimes will do the complete opposite of GP and still succeed. Best interest and Sportsmanship (or maybe Rules of war is a better word) are the real world applications, GP does not exist.
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That is exactly the purpose behind Dean and Woodie's philosophies. If students can understand and make use of gracious professionalism on a regular basis, they will
become the real world in the very near future, and will not hesitate to apply what they've learned while participating in FIRST. As I've said over and over, it's acknowledged the world has it's problems pertaining to company/market interaction, and at this point it can be quite cuthroat. The idea behind FIRST is to inspire science and technology to the point where people can respect each other, at least on those grounds. Rather than "your robot is better than mine," we see "that's a cool design! can you show me how it works?" There's much more "let me show you how we did this" than "We're better than you." If students maintain this level of integrity when they move into the real world, the real world will change for the better. However, it
will not happen overnight. It will take years, even decades for the message to work it's way up the corporate ladder. Once it does, I believe we can expect a much less volitile market, and our civilization will advance even further with companies working together and sharing ideas/technology to better the world as a whole, rather than meet a certain product sales quota, or boost quarterly earnings. Imagine where our technology would be if companies did work together. This is what Gracious Professionalism means to me. That is where I hope the world is heading thanks to FIRST.