Another Culture Change

[boomergeek]

Gracious professionalism does not call attention to transgressions (even attention that leaves "perpetrators" anonymous)- GP publicly calls attention to positive behavior.

Jealousy is real - it can not be invalidated just because it is judged morally wrong. Having a thread that makes moral judgements about those that feel they have less than others does not serve a great purpose. Lecturing people not to be jealous from the perspective of already having a lot generally falls on deaf ears.

Those that have more resources should be thankful and feel lucky and privileged to be part of a powerhouse. Almost all also feel greater responsibility to give to other teams, even without other teams asking for help. FIRST is foremost about generosity of spirit: competition is just a tool.

Students and mentors and families can see the disparity in resources between teams. Some resort to trying to make themselves feel better by imagining malicious or braggart behavior on the part of some members of a powerhouse. They can sometimes take tiny anecdotes out of context and let their imaginations run wild.

Gracious Professionalism is about calling yourself out, not calling out the transgressions of others. It's not about calling attention to being wronged or attention to others like you being wronged, it's about embracing life as it comes.


What is more important? Trying to stop a false rumor at a competition or trying to help a team onto a more rationale track?
(I view negative gender/racial/ethnic comments as totally unacceptable and need to be nipped in the bud with zero tolerance)
But those are not anywhere in the same space as noticing and commenting on how much students actually touch and repair a robot during a competition.
(I think the actual facts point to most powerhouse teams have many times more well-trained students than the weaker teams do).

The GP thing to do is to be as generous as you can and be as anti-judgmental as possible whether you are a powerhouse or a fledgling team. If you notice a team with a bad attitude at a competition, what is the right GP response? Being overtly generous at the competition? Or making a series of generous overtures to the bad attitude team outside of the competition (and across many years) without ever letting them know you think they have/had a bad attitude?

Once you have befriended them, they will likely learn on their own to have a better attitude. Once you are friends then you can also more easily approach subjects that you have differing perspectives on. All without ever calling them out, and certainly not calling them out in a public forum (even anonymously).

OK, enough of my own judgementalism. Let me know where I got it wrong.