We are coming to 3 weeks complete of build season and, like many other teams, are looking at our progress saying 'we could be a bit further along...'. (Well, I say this everyday, and will probably keep saying it for the next however many days...) Last year we aggressively cut our schedule with the idea that our time spent in the lab would be more productive, and adding some time away from the lab would keep everyone (students and mentors!) better rested. While we are not working 7 days a week, we have added back some time, with the goal of playing catch-up and getting as close to our original schedule as we can.
Managing Time
Stop build day is a known day. Today is a known day. We need to have the most complete, best robot in the bag in 25 calendar days. We have some parts of the robot "finished". We have prototypes made of wood. We have hopes and dreams made in CAD. Once again, we turn to our robot requirements. Given where we are, what steps get us from here to achieving priority number 1, 100% in every match? Focus our efforts. We have limited mentor availability for reviews. We have limited availability on the router or mill. We have plenty of students still building prototypes or helping assemble the finished pieces. What is the minimum next item we need? What comes next? How do we create a process that allows us to "complete" the next system to a point that it meets our needs? How do we ensure we are capable of iterating on an idea once it is "complete"? How do we all stay sane? Answering these questions helps us visibly progress forward while still meeting our goals.
"Hey Bobby, put 'Save early, save often'. It's a new quote, add it to the blog." - Lead Design Mentor
Our ideal build season process is: one mentor, one student lead, and several worker students per subsystem. This year, we have 4 subsystems, 4 design leads, and 1 full-time design mentor. He runs around a lot. We have several other mentors who aid design leads with CAD and design support, but they handle other items such as manufacturing or electrical. The final reviews all come from one mentor. At this point in time, his job now is to help the current highest priority item finish their current spec, then pass off mentor responsibilities to the appropriate manufacturing mentor. Our shop has 2 vertical mills, a CNC router, and an enclosed mill and lathe. The router is by far the most used piece of equipment in our shop. It can run one sheet at a time, one thickness at a time, one tool at a time. The router is large enough that we can share parts that use the same material. Most work done on the lathe or mills is run one part at a time. Each machine has a student running, and a mentor observing. While we have 5 larger machines, we have 2 manufacturing mentors (though we do have more than 5 students certified to run machines!). At this point in time, our forward progress is limited by what we are able to safely accommodate.
Structure
One lesson we push here on CyberKnights is ownership. Coupled nicely with responsibility. We try to have students stay on the same sub-team throughout the year. Oftentimes, rookie and second year students will float around a little, 3rd and 4th year students will generally be leads and subsystem owners, so, they remain with their specific components. Every year so far, a student has risen to the position of Engineering Lead. This student often works with myself and the head coach for items such as overall robot direction, and making cutoff or schedule decisions. While we use the title, we usually have not forced or elected this student. Each year they rise up and take the responsibility for the overall robot.
Our remaining structure matches most other teams of whom I've seen their student breakdown. We have our engineering lead, subsystem leads such as for chassis, lift mechanism, intake mechanism, climb or endgame mechanism. We also have a software lead, electrical/pneumatic lead, and safety captain. Each team has several students under each lead, and several mentors behind. Outside of engineering, we have a full business team, with a business lead, outreach lead and marketing/PR lead. On average, the team consists of 30-35 students, and 10-15 full-time mentors. This ensures that we have a solid student to mentor ratio for education and experience purposes, with enough students to manage work both in the lab, and at competition.
<Side note: I had this outline written before reading JVN's latest posts. As he delves a bit more into the House of Black, I too will dive a bit more into our student-mentor responsibilities here.>
"This is the whole process of dealing with us as mentors. We just sit back here and heckle while you try to work." - Lead Design Mentor
Every year, we will produce and field a competitive robot. (Let's just skip 2015...) Every year we will make mistakes, learn and grow. (Wait, this one can include 2015) Every year, we have a new baseline of students, experience, veteran members, and rookies. (This also applies to 2015.) Each year we hold a quick self-evaluation on our strengths and weaknesses. This year, we have a pretty fresh design team. Our goal, for education and life skills, is to provide guidance to students. Our mantra for mentors is: mentor with our hands in our pockets. During day 1 game breakdown, our head coach is at the board, talking, writing, driving the flow of the day. Those two previous sentences make sense, I promise. Our philosophy is to let students attempt, and help them fail gracefully if they fail. (We all failed... semi-gracefully... in 2015.) Mentors will step in and force decisions only on the grounds of safety, or complete non-productivity. The traditional course of mentor-ship runs through asking probing questions and guiding students toward solutions without spoon-feeding the answer. For design, our mentors try to sit beside the students, and let them go through the learning curve of Solidworks. The students will understand the entire process of concept to final design. Students quickly learn that the last 10% of the work takes 90% of the time. For electrical and software, the teams are smaller, and the workload is just as large. Students write a lot of code, solder a lot of pins, and run a lot of wire. These teams can quickly become places where mentors dive into failures, understand issues first for themselves, then present their findings to the team.
Every year, we will produce and field a competitive robot. (Again, just ignore 2015.) Some years, we have strong design, integration, and fabrication. Some years we have fewer students, or less experience, or both. If we slip in design, mentors may step in during fabrication and assembly. Last year, I spun wrenches to mount the compressor on our robot. I worked with a student who cut tube, ran tube, and mounted valves and cylinders. Our mentors step in, only when necessary, to ensure that our robot is complete.
Fun Stuff
We're in the middle of the big stress crunch here. So let's talk about the fun things! CyberKnights is a competitive robotics team, but we are also a family. Week nights and Saturdays we have team meals together. It gets rather loud. Topics get rather... strange... Having 45 minutes every day to cool off and just relax helps bond our team members. Our design room has multiple vibes depending on the time of day and the participants. Some days the lights are off and the strobe light is pulsing. Sometimes there's music blaring. Sometimes the sun shines. (Ha! Just kidding, Seattle winter is never sunny.) In the past our team has engaged in games of tag, parking lot frisbee, and more. While we aim to learn, build, and achieve, we also like to take time to grow friendships and have some fun.
"It's awesome. I've already had the opportunity to screw up my kids, now I have the opportunity to screw up other peoples' kids." - Lead Design Mentor
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