I'm Team Captain!

[DrewMatic]

Thanks!

[31Josh61]

really good ideas

[rockinthespecs]

I was a freshman this year and I think it would be really cool if you had a mentorship program with the younger and older students. I came into the team knowing nothing, and I felt intimidated. If you have a program where underclassman can learn from the older students, it might help new team members feel more welcome and less intimidated.

[Hitchhiker 42]

Originally Posted by rockinthespecs

I was a freshman this year and I think it would be really cool if you had a mentorship program with the younger and older students. I came into the team knowing nothing, and I felt intimidated. If you have a program where underclassman can learn from the older students, it might help new team members feel more welcome and less intimidated.

Our team essentially developed this program and implemented it this year for the first time (we call it the "mini-me program"). Each project leader and the captain is paired with a new member, to allow them to grow and learn a lot from the experienced members. Our team is pretty small, so it's worked out to be pretty 1:1, which worked out really well. I think it definitely helped some of our students decide to stay.

[Charlie Randall]

Communication with your team is very important, make sure they always know what your thinking. Also try to befriend as many teams as possible in your area. Lots of teams are always happy to help if you need it, and its great to actually know some people at an event, other than the ones on your team!

[Hgree56]

One thing I've learned as President of our team this past year is that you have to be at your top ability at all times. How can you expect everyone else to excel if you don't?

[dirtbikerxz]

Here are the main points that I try to follow:
1. Don't get arrogant and cocky because you are a captain. You have to continue behaving as you were before the selection. Remember your team picked you because of who you were originally, they wouldn't want you to change (especially for the worst).

2. Don't necessarily expect everyone to automatically start listening to you and start following you. You still have to earn their trust. And especially don't get angry at them if they ignore you. Calm down and try to talk to them.

3. Be someone who you would want leading you. Be friends with everyone, never isolate anyone from anything. Especially since you are a captain now, you cannot have bias without extreme reason.

4. Always listen to your coaches and mentors. They are still your "captain", and they run the team.... you don't.

5. Step in if there are any situations that are escalating. Sometimes you have to be the glue that holds the team together, especially in high stress situations like regional or end of build seasons. You have to be able to push your team through.

6. You still have to be one of the hardest workers. You have to do jobs that other people don't want to do, in order to motivate them to do it. Remember no one wants to do something that is hard and annoying, and especially don't want to do it when even their captain doesn't want to do it.

7. Enjoy your role, recognize that your teammates believe in you to be able to lead them, and understand your responsibility. That doesn't mean you get to slack off the work though.

I will add more if I think of anything else! Hope you have successful years as captain!

[TheCrayButton]

Funny that you ask this question because I just posted a video about this. You can check it out here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LrhZ8Xvgo5w

Hope that helps!