Gracious Professionalism

[4throck]

Let's Socrates this thread up a little bit. We have been given many examples of gracious professionalism, but these are just the bees. I'm looking for the hive.

What is gracious professionalism, and can it be taught?

[JaneYoung]

Originally Posted by 4throck

Let's Socrates this thread up a little bit. We have been given many examples of gracious professionalism, but these are just the bees. I'm looking for the hive.

What is gracious professionalism, and can it be taught?

Taken from the FIRST website:

Gracious Professionalism

Dr. Woodie Flowers, FIRST National Advisor and Pappalardo Professor of Mechanical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, coined the term "Gracious Professionalism."

Gracious Professionalism is part of the ethos of FIRST. It's a way of doing things that encourages high-quality work, emphasizes the value of others, and respects individuals and the community.

With Gracious Professionalism, fierce competition and mutual gain are not separate notions. Gracious professionals learn and compete like crazy, but treat one another with respect and kindness in the process. They avoid treating anyone like losers. No chest thumping tough talk, but no sticky-sweet platitudes either. Knowledge, competition, and empathy are comfortably blended.

In the long run, Gracious Professionalism is part of pursuing a meaningful life. One can add to society and enjoy the satisfaction of knowing one has acted with integrity and sensitivity.

The answer to 'can it be taught?' Yes, it can be taught. It can be role modeled. It can be lived as a way of life. It can be understood. It can be explained. It can be demonstrated. It can be recognized. It can be celebrated.

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If you would like each person to provide their definition, I think that is happening in this thread already with excellent examples that are the honey, produced from the understanding and implementation of Gracious Professionalism.

[Joe G.]

I have found that GP can be taught, but the best way to do so is to experience it. It is also easy to teach it incorrectly. For example, I have a friend on a VEX team who's lead coach, quite honestly, talked his students into building an inferior design because winning with the origional design would have been un-GP The kids got sick of the phrase, because the question "but is it Graciously Professional" was brought up for every idea having to do with the team.

The best way to teach it is to tell stories, and get the students to put themselves in the place of the team recieving help. Some that I have seen, from all 3 levels of FIRST:

-At a FLL competition, there were two robots using the pneumatics system. Neither team had any spare cylinders. One team's cylinder cracked, rendering it useless. The team with the broken cylinder had one more run, which was coming up very soon. The other pneumatic team offered to remove a cylinder from their robot for the other team to use. The cylinder was removed with efforts from members of both teams, used successfully, and then reinstalled by both teams just in time for the team with the good cylinder's run.

-My FLL team went to the world championship in 2005. A few weeks before atlanta, they went to a local tournament, and made a horrifying discovery: that our mat, which had been in use for six months, had been roughed up by our robot's motion, and had considerably more friction than the brand new competition mats. The tournament director allowed us to take home two of the new mats from the competition to practice on.

-A vex team's laptop crashed. The programs were still avalible on a flash drive. A team about to face them in the finals not only lent them their computer, but also pointed out a way to optimise their autonomous mode.

-In FRC last year, our team discovered a major design flaw during our inspection, which required major work. Two neighboring teams, and even our inspector, pitched in to help us out.


As for what gracious professionalism is, I think it can be summed up by the statement of a former member of my former FLL team:

"Gracious Professionalism is when your Noobish Yu-Gi-Oh cards get mixed with Alex's Deck (Alex had really good cards) and you return them all correctly."

[Alan Anderson]

Originally Posted by 4throck

...can it be taught?

I don't know if it can be "taught" in any way other than by example.

It can certainly be learned.