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Re: Poll: Reasonable and achievable, or shooting for the stars?
When I started mentoring, we were a shoot for the stars team. Our ambition far outstripped our experience, our fabrication resources, and sometimes our budget. It led to frustration, burnout, and anger.
Now we go for what is reasonable and achievable for us, and we try to move that bar up a bit each year. That doesn't mean that we don't take on anything challenging during build season, but we try to make sure that we have a fallback position if new challenges don't work out, and that we're not taking on so many challenges we end up overwhelmed. We're trying new things, but keeping some things (like our chassis) simple. We still make mistakes, but now mistakes are setbacks that lead to a late night or two instead of soul-crushing, season-ending disasters.
Students still try new things, they're still inspired, and we're probably going to aim for a crazy shooter for our off-season competitions, since that's one of the skills we want to start building.
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