Let's Put the Professionalism back in Gracious Professionalism

[msd]

A lot of people are responding about GP, posts on these forums, etc, all of which are relevant, but a broader issue came to my mind when I read Katy's post:

FIRST doesn't seem to foster an attitude of openness.

What do I mean by that? In technology, for example, think..."open standards", "open architectures", etc. Think...a generally cooperative attitude of letting people offer input on your stuff, and letting your stuff work with other people's stuff, so that the world at large is better off.

Sometimes I think FIRST gets so caught up in being FIRST, it loses sight of its own goals.

The stated vision is to create "a world where science and technology are celebrated", but sometimes it seems more like they are trying to create "a world where FIRST is celebrated". Sometimes it seems as though the mission to "inspire young people to be science and technology leaders", has become a mission to "inspire everyone to be FIRST marketeers".

And truthfully, that's not that bad. FIRST is a *good* thing.

However, there are plenty of other good things out there too...but god help you if you mention any of them at a FIRST event/forum/whatever, you're likely to be chastised as if you just ran over someone's kitten. Not an attitude of openness.

And it's similar if you openly criticize some of FIRST's decisions and practices, though thankfully there are a few (very few, it seems) official channels/forums for this to take place, where this is handled more gracefully. But in general, it seems to be "FIRST's way or the highway".

You can't please all of the people all of the time...but you *can* listen to them, and work with them, and consider that maybe your way isn't necessarily the best way, and realize that it's alright if there are people other than you and yours out there furthering your own goals.

Again, FIRST is great, truly great.

But it seems to me that some folks have gotten so caught up in FIRST for FIRST's sake, that they have forgotten FIRST's goals...