How should leaders be selected?

[Sam390250]

Our team (our largest size in the last 6 years has been ~25 students, ranging down to 11 students) has gone with a cover letter/resume/interview process all reviewed/run by the mentors for the last 5 years. Initially these were reserved just for those applying for leadership positions, but now all students are invited/encouraged to participate each year to give them practice for future interviews within our team for leadership positions and beyond. It is conducted very much like a job interview (professional attire, multiple interviews with different mentors, etc).

With such a small team, most of the leadership positions (Electrical Lead, Firmware Lead, Electro-Mechanical Lead, Chassis Lead, Media Lead, Scouting Lead, etc) are already known ahead of time because only one person is interested, but there have been several cases of two students competing for a role. This system has seemed to work fairly well at preparing students for future interviews as well as keeping order with the leads.

I will note that our drive team is not chosen in this way. Though it is also a decision by the mentors, it is done during the build season and weighs skill, driver/field experience, rule knowledge, judgment calls, etc. Only members who pass our team's game rules test with a certain score on the first try (I believe it is a 90%) are allowed to try out for any drive team positions (including human player). There is no application for this process and any interviews with the candidates are not formal.