Taking the plunge. . .

[Brandon Holley]

Originally Posted by dellagd

Its alot harder I believe with a smaller team. For example, if you have 100 members, everyone coming in twice a week may be perfectly fine to produce a great robot, but the same does NOT go for a 20 person team (Unfortunately).

I believe your notion of "more bodies = better robot" is simply not true. Many very successful teams each year make do with relatively smaller teams. A 100 person team is much more difficult to manage than a smaller team because engaging 100 people is just that much harder.

Originally Posted by dellagd

You have to put in the time to accomplish your task, and I think when people start Wanting to come in and work all the time, you can have a great team. A half effort on time will produce a half as good robot.

Now I can get behind this statement.

What really drives strong teams is the culture (this is true for strong companies as well). If the culture is there to allow people to innovate, learn, grow and FAIL along the way while striving for excellence at every opportunity, the rest will take care of itself. The team will grow in size because that passion will infect the team members who will spread it to their friends who will spread it to their friends, etc. Establishing this culture is something every company in the world tries to do and many of them fail to remotely achieve.

Originally Posted by dellagd

Motivation of other people is a hard thing to do.

You've just nailed one of the strongest themes of a professional career, motivation. Excellent managers are ones that can ignite passion in their employees. This skill is very hard to find in people, however I have seen many people with this skill involved in FIRST.

-Brando