How to Best Manage a Small Team

[angelah]

We have 8-12 students on the payroll each year, but what has worked well for us is to increase the number of dedicated students from 3-4 to 7-8. Once you get above a half dozen dedicated, fully involved students, things run more smoothly. We did this by having students sign in and using their attendance, in part, to determine who gets to do what, both in the shop and at competitions. When students see a reward for giving up other things for time at robotics, they start to take it more seriously. When the student who comes one day a week has the same privileges and rights as the students who come every day, there is little incentive to put in more time.

I agree that you can ask people to choose. And those who make the choice for robotics become your main team. The others get secondary roles, enough to keep them involved a bit and possibly inspire them to choose robotics in future years.

Because of our small size, we don't have sub-teams. Every student on our team could do most any job, just to a greater or lesser extent based on their experience. I kind of like that the size of our team creates that dynamic.