Gracious Professionalism > Ungracious Unprofessionalism

[petek]

Last weekend I met Sabrina Varanelli, founder of team 1302, and I asked her what was the hardest part of starting her team up and she replied "getting the team to understand gracious professionalism". It really is a foreign concept to most people, especially those new to FIRST. We live in such a competitive society, where it often seems that the majority are just in it for themselves, that the idea that you would help strangers - your competitors no less - seems almost blasphemous. Witness the popularity of TV shows like Survivor and The Apprentice.

Another factor which may contribute to the challenging nature of some CD posts is the "banter" (as my daughter calls it) in many of our normal conversations. To listen to her talk with her sister, you might think that they loathe each other, though they are really very close. This challenge-based communication is fun when used between friends and well-known co-workers, but it's likely to intimidate, or even enrage others in a public forum like CD. Maybe we need a [BANTER] <your flame here> [/BANTER] tag!

So what to do? Think Tolerant. For example, rather than reply to an un-searched post with a flame, reply with some links to the posts they would have found if they searched, and a gentle reminder about "search is your friend" at the end. Remember that it is a really good thing that everyone thinks different and has different beliefs. What fun would life be if we did all think alike?

[Conor Ryan]

Great point, I've been a frequenter of ChiefDelphi for about 7 months now, and even in the short time that I've been here I've seen the forums go up and down, at times its Cutthroat (recently is an example) whereas other times it was the great thing since robots were thought of (such as just before the championship) But something I've definitely learned is to ask myself after i click the Spell Check button (spell correctly people!) Do I want to submit this? lets take a look at this people, this is a public forum where many of our peers read, a couple of aggravated posts can change what people think of you.

Here are a couple of tips that can always help when posting,
-Do you really want to post what you just typed? its OK to delete it or edit it!
-don't take things too seriously, there is a tendency around here to for people to take a couple of remarks too seriously
-Search before creating a new topic, also make sure you search all forums, you may have missed a topic devoted to what you are looking for
-There never is a "best" its always opinion
-Spell Check!
-Try not to go political or religious in these forums, there are other sites for stuff like that
-Respect any Admin/Moderator decision
-keep a sense of humor, watch posting and you

Happy Postings!

[Tom Bottiglieri]

I could write 3 pages about my outlook on this situation, but I decided to be concise.

I think some people just take all of this too seriously.

[petek]

Originally Posted by cdr1122334455

-keep a sense of humor, watch posting and you

Memo to Brandon: here's one for the Newbie button!

Thanks for sharing this - I still have a grin and giggle thing going.

[Emily Pease]

Originally Posted by cdr1122334455

Here are a couple of tips that can always help when posting,
-Do you really want to post what you just typed? its OK to delete it or edit it!
-don't take things too seriously, there is a tendency around here to for people to take a couple of remarks too seriously
-Search before creating a new topic, also make sure you search all forums, you may have missed a topic devoted to what you are looking for
-There never is a "best" its always opinion
-Spell Check!
-Try not to go political or religious in these forums, there are other sites for stuff like that
-Respect any Admin/Moderator decision
-keep a sense of humor, watch posting and you

Good list! I would also like to add:

- You don't have to have perfect syntax and grammar, but if you want other posters to take you seriously, it helps to be able to form a coherent sentence. And let's face it, it's not really that hard, is it?
- Use your English skills to find the nicest way to say whatever you want to say. If there isn't a nice way to say something, you probably don't need to say it, at least not on a public forum. For example, disagreeing is fine, but instead of saying, "You're wrong!" you could just as easily say, "I disagree with you because..."
- Easy on the smileys! Please?
- If you're in so much of a rush that you can't type out entire words ("you" instead of "u", etc), you probably don't have time to be browsing an online forum.

[nateoffong]

I'd agree

I don't post much (if you can't tell), but i read alot. Sometimes i want to post and return the fact that they're being a little short tempered there, and it kinda stops me. I'm not going to waste all my time doing that stuff.
It's not nice. End of story

[KenWittlief]

wow! I made the mistake of venturing into a thread a couple days ago on a political subject, and I got absolutely HAMMERED with assualts on my intelligence, comments on my grammer and punctuation (or lack there of)

I was accused of spreading half-truths and lies (with no rebuttal to the actual statements themselves, whatever they were)

and I was repeatedly hit with thinly vailed insults

To put it bluntly, Im appalled to see people on this forum think that insulting someone, name calling, labeling, or criticizing someone elses language, spelling, punctuation... is either appropriate, acceptable, or that this somehow makes your point for you

or that flinging a mulititude of insults and induendos is even better

If you know what someone is saying then they have communicated their message, there is no need for every post to have perfect spelling or grammer

logic and reasoning skills should be required in public schools. If you are in a passionate debate, insulting the other person and criticizing their language skills contributes nothing to your position.

[Bharat Nain]

Originally Posted by petek

Last weekend I met Sabrina Varanelli, founder of team 1302, and I asked her what was the hardest part of starting her team up and she replied "getting the team to understand gracious professionalism". It really is a foreign concept to most people, especially those new to FIRST. We live in such a competitive society, where it often seems that the majority are just in it for themselves, that the idea that you would help strangers - your competitors no less - seems almost blasphemous. Witness the popularity of TV shows like Survivor and The Apprentice.

I have to say that Sabrina did a very good job in teaching her team what Gracious Professionalism is. She is one of the few examples of great student leaders in FIRST.

I feel the level of gracious professionalism has gone down(just a little bit) in the past year or so, but it can be re-enforced. Yet, FIRST is one of the few sports in which Gracious Professionalism prevails at such a good level. These are principles we students need to learn while we are young.

I think the "Search before you post" response was formulated because everyone was frustrated by the re-occurring threads.

Anyways, you brought up a nice point Matt, good job.

[BandChick]

Gracious Professionalism is supposed to be the backbone in FIRST competitions. When I talk about the program I explain how even though it's COMPETITIVE we still work TOGETHER. One of my fondest memories was 2003's NJ Regional. 1156 (from Brazil) was a rookie team as was 1089. Unfortunately, the team had to ship their robot in pieces and reconstruct it the Thursday of the regional. I remember 1089 and team 25 coming together with tools and help to put their robot back together.

After 56 won Philadelphia, 1089 had a large discussion about raising money for them to go to Nationals. Nationals, for me, was one of the best experiences I've had in FIRST and it's one of the main reasons I keep coming back. Everyone in FIRST deserves the opportunity to experience what I have. They too have worked hard on they're robot and are worthy opponents- they beat us !

Our team is about helping, inspiring, and overall just being friendly. What better way to show how we feel about FIRST than to do anything we can to support it?

Something Mr. Gregory said that I find inspiring is the following:

" [FIRST] is ultra-competitive, but the point is that you're not trying to out-do your competition off the playing field. You want every team to have the best chance that they possibly could have. It could mean different things at different times. We've had numerous cases where we'd help a team fix their robot only to face them in the next round. Why? We want a good round, and we'd hate to see someone have to forefeit because of a broken bot. Someone needs a sprocket? we're there... a spare motor? sure thing... and in return, we hope that other teams would do the same thing (and they often do)."

[dhitchco]

Does anyone have a good "one-pager" on how we (within FIRST) define "gracious professionalism"? I want a short description to give to incoming students in order to "set the stage" as newbies on the team.

Also, I've seen 99.9% living examples of gracious professionalism here on the CD forum as well as in the various FIRST events. Sure, in written form on this forum (and any other e-mail written correspondence) it is MUCH MORE IMPORTANT to follow these rules than it is for an in-person dialog:

1) Read the person's words twice; first for content and again for "tone" of writing style
2) The internet forums and e-mail is NOT a place to practice "text messaging" shorthand. You've got a full-screen view, so use it and use the language properly.
3) Sure, do a "search" first. They call it "putting your brain in gear before engaging your mouth". Then when you do post a query, it's fine to state "I tried to do a search, but....."
4) And....when you do reply....pretend that you're the recipient not the author. Many times I stash an outgoing e-mail for 24 hours before sending just to see if my "tone" and "mood" might have changed. Also, spell-check will get you lots of "points" with the person reading your thread.

I'm so thrilled and proud to be a rookie part of FIRST. Even at my age, many of the students have taught me so much about the true meaning of "gracious professionalism". Keep it up.

[Brandon Martus]

Originally Posted by dhitchco

Does anyone have a good "one-pager" on how we (within FIRST) define "gracious professionalism"? I want a short description to give to incoming students in order to "set the stage" as newbies on the team.

The poster in this white paper may do the trick: http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/pa...le&paperid=117

It's two years old, but GP is GP.

[Mike Ciance]

I'd like to start off by saying one very important thing

This thread is one of the best examples of gracious professionalism I have seen here in a long time.

I have already given rep points to 9 people in this thread. it's really great to see that when GP is brought to our attention again we are able to pull it off beautifully. now what we need to work on is having this kind of attitude all the time.

for all the bad i have seen on these forums, the main problem has been people takign things too seriously. i think there are a few guidelines that should be followed, some of which have already been mentioned, and some i am bringing up myself:

• don't give negative rep points for "newbie mistakes"
• be polite when posting a "search before you post" reminder
• for mistakes that are careless, not malicious, try to take advantage of the "neutral rep point" to give them a reminder without harming their rating. we ALL make mistakes, even Brandon and Dave
• try not to give negative reps on controversial threads. somebody who expresses dissapproval of an idea is only insulting that idea, NOT the people who follow it.
• if you really want to practice gracious professionalism, only give negative reps to those who fail to practice it themselves

[Matt Krass]

First, I want to thank you all, your responses were more enthusiastic than I hoped, and there’s been a noted lack of the aforementioned hostilities. You’ve helped restore some of my faith in these forums.

Now, down to business…
The point of this thread was to bring to light some issues that I felt needed to be addressed, both within FIRST and on these forums. As many have stated in the pits I felt the familiar warm reception to questions and comments, and teams that were very GP and helpful. WPI (190) handed over several little things that saved us without a moments hesitation, whilst Jeff Waegelin in the 830 pit was always dealing with my crazy questions with a straight face on, no snappiness, even when things got really hectic. It’s on of the reasons I came back to FIRST this year and I’m happy to see it’s not gone. Thanks again for your kind words and let’s work together to make these forums, and FIRST as best as we can. I know I’ll be giving out more rep points now when I see GP on the boards, I ask that you all do also, if you don’t already. With positive influences, I’m sure we can improve the situation. I don’t expect perfection, and maybe I’m holding people to standards too high to be fair, but I expect we can all meet them.

Long Live Gracious Professionalism, and long live F.I.R.S.T.

Though I’ve been on these forums for nearly three years, I haven’t shaken things up much, or made any significant posts until recently, and the responses I received made me smile because they’re hard evidence GP is still around, thanks again for restoring my faith in it.

Thanks.

P.S. I’m just as guilty as everyone of skipping a search when in a hurry to post, I’m sure you’ve all done it too, let’s be a little easier on those that don’t search first? Genia’s approach is perfect, answers the questions, points out the search and manages to be tactful and gentle at the same time.

[meaubry]

Great thread - thank you to all of the contributors to it.
I just want to make sure everyone knows that we (ChiefDelphi leadership) appreciate and are also concerned about this issue.
My response will focus on the lack of GP on our website by the users, as the bigger problem (FIRST in general) is for another day.
Let me begin by not re-stating every GOOD thing that has already been stated, but instead present a couple of things that we struggle with as the host.
1) How to be fair and reasonable to everyone - and I do mean everyone - that visits and wants to share ideas, thoughts, questions, etc.
We request everyone be kind, be tolerant, be helpful, don't do this and don't do that.
We have the best group of moderators, helpful regulars, and mentors that any site could ask for, including the best webmaster.
We trust (maybe too much) that people that come here (to CD) are inherently good and want to help others.
We tend to allow everyone have their own opinion (sometimes others are not going to agree with everything someone else believes) and we have been discussing way to limit discussion on topics where there is naturally going to be differences of opinion. (Religious and Politically discussion to name a couple)
The site is intended to share ideas and help others - at times it looks more like an on line message board with multiple posts between few people that just won't let go of their argument. These are the ones that usually turn ugly - perhaps we need to implement the 2 post rule to each thread. I'll have to ask Brandon if thats possible.
2) How to improve the "Welcome to the community of FIRST- we really do want to help" feeling with newer users.
Again, some of you regulars have been a extremely helpful - and unfortunately some of you have not been.
The growth rate of this website has been a difficult thing to manage (and I am not referring to he technical side, I am referring the the HUMAN relations side).
I believe that our posting "rules" cannot by themselves fix the problem - that can only be accomplished by continued support by the mentors and more importantly by the non-newbies and in the way that each of you respond.
Everyone has a list of things that annoy them about website posting - please
a) review your list
b) determine if there is something we (CD) can do to avoid those annoyances
c) send your suggestions to us (we are always looking for ways to improve the website)
d) add at the bottom of your list "I promise to be more tolerant with the people that post on CD, they may not have the same opinion as me - but that doesn't make them a bad person."

Sorry about the long post - just wanted to encourage everyone help us address this issue.
If we don't do something, we will lose the ability to be what we truly want this website to be.

Mike Aubry
ChiefDelphi