Team Motivation

[Kevin Dunn]

Seeing all of these running cars is kind of depressing me. Our chassis isn't even 100% complete yet and we rarely have a decent amount of people in our lab, even on the weekends. Some of the 08 alumni's do more work than the students getting credit...

So that being said, what do you guys do to motivate the dead beats on your team? I've got my Powertrain team leader basically laughing at me when I give him deadlines. It's been a month since he first said he'd have our prototype intake done. Everything "will get done" according to him.

[Kevin Dunn]

Seeing all of these running cars is kind of depressing me. Our chassis isn't even 100% complete yet and we rarely have a decent amount of people in our lab, even on the weekends. Some of the 08 alumni's do more work than the students getting credit...

So that being said, what do you guys do to motivate the dead beats on your team? I've got my Powertrain team leader basically laughing at me when I give him deadlines. It's been a month since he first said he'd have our prototype intake done. Everything "will get done" according to him.

[Scalesy]

Unfortunately what happens on most fsae teams is that the dead beats cause so much delay, the lead guys end up taking on more responsibility than they already have. Any fsae captain (or system lead) could tell you this.

The fact is that these people are just simply not the motivated, and most importantly, dedicated type like we are...hence why they are not in charge. I can tell you right now that none of the dead beats contribute to the forums either because it requires effort. They also seem to know everything about everything as well.

That being said, bribing doesn't work, but neither does cutting back their privileges. You can't give them MORE privileges either. I think the best way to go about it is to sit down, AWAY FROM THE SHOP with said dead beat, and have SEVERAL people confront the person...this way its not just coming from "the boss."

Good luck, I've been in this situation before and it's never easy. Remember, only dead fish swim with the tide ;-)

Jon Scales
2009 Team Captain
Hartford Motorsports

[bahous]

Another way that helps in developing motivation is to bring these people to the competition with you.

When they just work on their respective university's car, they don't grasp the importance of every little component on the car. And most of them just join the team to tell their friends they're building a race car and to put it on their CV.

However, when brought to a competition, 90% of new members witness the importance of every minute of work that was put on the car prior to getting their. They appreciate the little jobs that were given to them by subteam leaders. And then, when they get back, they start putting more effort into their participation.

Trust me, that's how it is in almost every university

[Mike Macie]

I used to call these people daily to get updates on progress, find out when they planned on doing more work, then follow up after to make sure they did what they said. I also had to go out of my way to make sure i was around when they were in the shop or made arrangements to meet up. It's definitely not fun dealing with these kinds of people and you can't be everyone's friend. If it gets real bad you can explain the situation to your faculty adviser and see if your adviser can speak to this person.

One team explained on this forum a plan where they have deadlines that are tied to a certain amount of the budget to fund their project. So if you don't meet your deadlines, you don't receive as much. I forgot the team but they said it was working well. Seems too late to implement for you now but it's an interesting approach.

[Conor]

Our students never received credit for being a part of the project so being the team leader had me trying to figure out this same problem for quite some time. To be honest, you can try every trick in the book, but you probably won't have any success. For our team, the best solution was just to have as much fun as possible as we could in the shop. Sure people would have liked to go to the bars on Friday and Saturday night, but we made coming into the shop seem like a "not so bad" alternative. By accident, a few of us starting going out for dinner and a couple of beers on Friday nights and then we would head back to the shop to finish up work for a couple of hours. As the weeks went on, the groups got bigger and eventually the whole team was coming along. We used the time to relax, MAYBE talk about the car, but mostly to have fun without the stress of deadlines. Sometimes we had too much beer and called it a night, and sometimes we headed back for several more hours. Eventually we learned to get together and do things that weren't FSAE related so we could just have a good time and blow off the emotions that come with facing the stress of deadlines. Get your team involved in doing things together that don't require working on the car and I think you'll have people coming back for the friends, despite not always being excited about the work aspect. I hope this helps. It sure worked wonders for our team.

[michaelwaltrip]

trust me, you're not the only team with these problems. even some of the teams with running cars right now are struggling with it.

i don't have a good answer for you, because i've been looking for one myself for years.

[Sam Zimmerman]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by michaelwaltrip:
trust me, you're not the only team with these problems. even some of the teams with running cars right now are struggling with it.

i don't have a good answer for you, because i've been looking for one myself for years. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Trust me, every engineering company out there struggles with this as well.

[Drew Price]

We're having our weekly team planning and group update meeting at the Chicago Auto Show this week.

Promises of 'new-people-drive-the-car-day' usually get good responses as well.

At the end of the day, the people who stick around and are enthusiastic are the ones who are personally invested in the outcome of the project, and who want to learn and apply their skills towards the project. You can't always instill that sort of drive, it comes with the person. We always say it's not about finding lots of new people to join, it's about finding the right people to join.

Best,
Drew

[oz_olly]

I couldn't agree with Conor more. If you can develop a culture within the team of inclusion and mateship people start to feel tied to the team and don't want to let the team down. Negative leadership techniques won't really work because people can always just leave if they want (especially in purely volunteer teams). The more you can do to build a team early in the cycle the better of you will be when things get tough later in the season. Going for a gokarting session, having a bbq and a few amber ales, fighting each other with fire works etc all these things really help to build a team where everyone is always keen to put in.

Cheers

Olly

[Kevin Dunn]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by Scalesy:
Unfortunately what happens on most fsae teams is that the dead beats cause so much delay, the lead guys end up taking on more responsibility than they already have. Any fsae captain (or system lead) could tell you this.

The fact is that these people are just simply not the motivated, and most importantly, dedicated type like we are...hence why they are not in charge. I can tell you right now that none of the dead beats contribute to the forums either because it requires effort. They also seem to know everything about everything as well.

That being said, bribing doesn't work, but neither does cutting back their privileges. You can't give them MORE privileges either. I think the best way to go about it is to sit down, AWAY FROM THE SHOP with said dead beat, and have SEVERAL people confront the person...this way its not just coming from "the boss."

Good luck, I've been in this situation before and it's never easy. Remember, only dead fish swim with the tide ;-)

Jon Scales
2009 Team Captain
Hartford Motorsports </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Definately agree with you. The most dedicated guys on our team are the two (myself and our Chassis Team Leader) that went to the 08 comp. We'll be taking the entire 2010 team with us this year.

And I HATE that our school bases this on credit. We're in the process of forming a 3-4 year "club" with senior project credit at the end...The more experience the students get the better! This would also form a more closely knit team throughout several years of working side by side.

[exFSAE]

This is very difficult to get right. Realistically you'll generally have 2-4 people who do the majority of the work, or at least a core group and "the rest."

Since it is mostly a volunteer operation, you have to generate an environment where people WANT to work on the car. Keep an eye on everyone's progress, offer to give them whatever help they need to get the job done. Group activities are good as well.. be it pizza once a week or a grill-out or a HW session or going out to the bars.

On the other hand, I don't believe that a good team leader / project manager is successful by being everyone's friend. Can't be lax.

Accountability is HUGE. At some point, it will come time that some hard work and long nights have to be done and people will want to flake out. Has to be hard accountability for missing deadlines, and this has to be set with someone with actually authority (ie your faculty advisor who runs the capstone / senior design class).

And I'd agree with Jon, if you really got a flake, have yourself and someone else go buy em a cup of coffee or a red bull or somethin, sit down, have a talk, see what's wrong. Sometimes you gotta take a big bite of humble pie...

[Hector]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">On the other hand, I don't believe that a good team leader / project manager is successful by being everyone's friend. Can't be lax.
</div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Unless they're the best type of leader, the kind that makes people want to work for them and exceed expectations. Some people are just gifted with this talent.

As far as motivation goes, there's a few things I've noticed during my time.
1)Volunteers won't work if it's all work and no play. This is supposed to be FUN! We are all in college, after all. It's after this that things get all boring and nine-to-fivey.

2)Get your guys in the car early. Do your shakedown, make sure it runs, then throw on some dead tires and let everyone do some laps or skidpad or something. We had fun laughing at the guys who got owned by our "team mom" who had never driven stick in her life on skidpad after our first drive this year.

3)Make sure no one thinks they're so valuable or necessary to the team that they can do whatever they want and get away with it. Yeah, chemo and surgery may be painful when it happens, but it's better to cut out the cancer then let it spread to the rest of the body. I can't think of a system on one of these cars that someone couldn't take over if you had to cut someone out.

[TorqueWrench]

I don't think there is a single team in FSAE that doesn't have problems motivating members.

I know that we took the car out after the first meeting for returning members to get a chance to drive. Returning members were re-motivated by this and new members were excited to see what they would be working on. New members were also told that they would get to drive after they had contributed something, which was reinforced by letting the most active new members drive a month later. To try to build the team, we also took everyone to laser tag and a local karting track.

A few other ways to keep new members motivated:
1) Have weekly full team meetings and weekly system meetings.
2) Set hard deadlines and hold people accountable.
3) Take time to explain to new members why things are done why they are
4) Start actual work as soon as possibe after your first meeting

Now that that is out of the way, the truth is that you will not be able to motivate everyone. Team leaders can normally tell who this will be very quickly and they simply won't be assigned key projects. Most people who are simply there for a resume booster don't stay around for very long from what I have seen.

Our team announced a few meetings ago that, due to budget constraints, only 18 members would be attending competition. This worked out to be each system leader and two members from each system. I immediately noticed the majority of the "deadbeats" have not come back after then.

[jeremy@fitinjection.com]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Reply </div></BLOCKQUOTE>
The best way I've found that seems to work is to use a plan (from a discussion with the group managers). Then, in the middle (emphasis on middle, not after it's too late) recreate a plan, based on what you now know (i.e. way behind schedule, part not even designed). In that middle re-plan, study (briefly) the problem with whoever's in charge of the deficient area, and have them walk you through it, or just start writing out (while speaking with them) what the whole thing is - problem statement, objective, and basically make a list of what the design needs to do (again), and likely ways that are best to solve it (maybe they're having trouble justifying or choosing one way over another, maybe they don't know how to solve a little problem, maybe they just need to ask someone for help), and then try to guess - with the help of the person in charge - how long each step of the design and manufacturing takes, what things can be done in parallel, what needs to be ordered ahead of time, what off-car testing needs done, etc..., and tweak it all to fit into an assemble-whole-car deadline. As project manager (typically the role of president, leader, whatever), you also need to coordinate all groups - so, say group x needs group z's dimensions or load calculations, whatever, you've got to piece the whole design process together, and make sure each group knows what the other group needs and when, then make it happen. Motivation isn't a pep talk or kick in the pants. It's usually helping to paint the picture, and emphasizing a plan and schedule. Don't wait until it's too late. Comaraderie isn't motivation (but helps, so invite all to beers and supper every so often).

I was and still am a hefty procrastinator, but, I am staying at a Han Ting Express tonight (somewhere in ChengDu, and I can reach from wall to wall with an arm and foot, literally)... Usually procrastinators are good thinkers, but need collaboration on planning and doing. As leader, it's not your job to wait, it's your job to make the plan come true via others.

[IronMike]

Some people have called '09 Formula Bus. For lack of better words you will always have people wanting to ride the bus and others wanting to drive.

[Wesley]

As someone who has been on both sides of the fence (a "lazy" member and a decent, contributing one) I can say that enjoying the time you spend with the team is key.

Late nights at the shop aren't always the most productive, because between the Youtube clips and the DVDA songs we all sing, and the pub thats 100 yards from our shop, sometimes we don't get all the work done, but it's a good time and builds the team on a level other than the frustration of getting deadlines met.

A strong sense of team spirit is the key. We really found this in '07. If everyone can step back and have a little fun, it makes it easier to buckle down to hammer the hard stuff out when it has to be done. This isn't a business, we're a group of students and people that have decided to work together to build a car. Making it a group based on shared interests and goals rather than assigned tasks and jobs makes it all a bit more enjoyable, because you're spending time with people like you.

[Scalesy]

just out of curiosity, has this person ever been to the competition? Because as someone pointed out, its definitely a major factor. You can't help but get motivated once you get a taste of the high stakes out there.

You know most powertrain guys are obsessed with add ons, turbos, etc. You need to make sure this person knows that they cannot do any additional features until they perfect, and finish what is ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY. Its one thing to "finish" the drivetrain, its another to make reliable.

What do you guys think de-motivates people from fsae anyway? I just find it really funny that a large portion of participants have no real interest in cars before they do this, and the kids that could name every make and model of production vehicle out there are the most useless and unmotivated.

[Mikey Antonakakis]

This has pretty much already been said, but:
-be a TEAM, and a group of friends as much as possible--don't be afraid to make fun of each other in good spirit and have inside jokes and practical jokes, even if it involves lighting your president on fire (not that we've ever done that o_0).
-results are the best way to get people motivated about the project--when one system is completed, everyone who has any sort of passion in them for what they do will be a lot more motivated to finish their own systems
-this is the hardest, but find people who give a fuck about what they are doing, and find out what motivates them. For instance, we have SEVERAL members on our team who have no real interest in driving the car. Yet a few of those people are the guys who put in the most time and the most effort into what they do to produce the best quality work. Me, I'm in it for the driving, feeling the acceleration I'll probably never experience again after this whole college thing is over. I am motivated to be a leader on the team, I have great ambition when it comes to this stuff and want to be the best... not better than anyone in particular, not to edge out competition, but to know I was doing the best I absolutely could, that I gave it my all, that I beat MYSELF. I know there are several other people on the team that feel the same way I do. That's why I only get a little pissed when people aren't holding their own weight... there are enough of us on the team now to pick up the slack, even though the car would be better if the slacker had the same passion as the rest of us. It really only takes one person who REALLY cares, and is man (or woman) enough to be a visible leader.
-stay positive... even when your budget gets wiped out because of a dyno purchase, "instead of staying in a crappy hotel room, let's go on a camping trip!" (true story)

[Sam Zimmerman]

Back when I was a senior a group of guys from our team would always put the books and tools down on Wed. night at 7pm and head to the local pub. $2.50 pitcher of beer + 10 cent hot wings (20 max) made for a $5 night of BS'ing and bouncing ideas off each others.

Not surprisingly, the guys who did this every Wed. were the guys that did 90% of the work.

[Marie21]

This is a very common problem for fsae teams.
I agree with most of the recommandations but there is a way to do it.

Every year, at the beginning of the automn semester, we try to find new members to join the team. Because we had some problems to motivate new members for many years, we offered them to come to the Toronto Shootout to make them realize that is a serious project. However, the effect was not the good one. They started criticizing the way the car was built and said why we don't do this or that....it would be better.... At this point, all they wanted is to drive the car because it was cool! There was no respect for all the work accomplished over the last 20 years! My point is : Bring new members at a competition only if they know the serious of the project and how many time it needs each year to design and build the car.

Going to big competition at the end of a year is really motivating for new members. My first year at the Detroit competition was very cool. At this moment, I really realize how big it was.
Bring new members at this kind of competition is very essential!

Also, I agree with the fact that it's not the quantity of members that counts but the quality of it. Unfortunately, people are not always what they look like. We have many documents about the fist interviews made with new members over the last 6-7 years. When we are looking at it, the comments made by the interviewers about each person we see that people who got negative feedbacks were the ones that brought the most to our team. Because of it, everyone could enter in our team. Anyway, there is always a natural selection. People that are not interest leave the project by theirselves.

About the BBQ! The problem with it is that only people who are really involve with the team participate to it! For us it doesn't work very well.

To motivate new members, we try to put them in team with a 3 or 4 year student. So they are doing their project together. This way, they feel they are responsible for something and they don't want to deceive somebody else. If you give them a concrete project for sure it will help. Also, they need a lot of support and feedback from "senior" members!

For sure, motivate members is something very difficult!

Marie-Michelle Guay
Team Manager
Universite Laval

[dkl]

I still have much to learn, but I think there are a few concepts that have been touched on already that I wanted to reiterate. First of all, there will always be a spread of how motivated each person on the team is. Of course trying to get the most out of everyone is good, but as a leader you have to understand that some people just aren't as into it, and that that is perfectly okay. No one is obligated to sell their soul to Formula. All you can really do is to get to know your teammates as well as possible and try to figure out what gets them personally motivated.

In terms of what gets people motivated in general, it's been my experience that people are the most intrinsically driven if they can see how they are a part of a an organization with a clear goal. Helping the team to develop a vision (this can't simply be created by one person) with clear values, and then helping everyone to see how they fit in will help people feel like they are contributing. Sometimes you'll need to take time to step back and reiterate that vision, sometimes you'll have to work with individuals to help them see how they can improve what they are doing either personally or technically. Other times it's useful to just hang out and get a beer, and still others when things need to be done democratically to promote "buy-in." Only very rarely is it effective to just tell people what to do or to really push the work pace. These might be effective for the short term, especially if you've built up a good rapport, but will quickly push people away and demotivate them.

Unfortunately, there will always be a portion of people that just don't respond to even the best intentions from the leadership on a team. Those people may or may not still have something to contribute, but should be approached as carefully and professionally as possible. The worst thing that can happen is for the interactions between those people and the leadership to cause dissonance within the rest of the team. Remember that leadership is always a balance of being a friend and a boss, and it's difficult if you're doing it right. Always be sure to pay attention to yourself, too... how are you acting has a huge impact on everyone.

Anyway, there are a number of good books out there. A couple that I'd recommend are "Primal Leadership" by Goleman et al (from where I'm getting a lot of what I've said), and "The Leadership Challenge" by Posner and Kouzes.

Good luck to everyone on completing their car and all.

[DonMolina]

Well, I can really sympathise with all these, but from what I hear FSAE is pretty much standard proceedure for most (if not all) universities out there -even obligatory some times (?).

But here in Greece, FSAE is totally and 100% something we the students are doing, and sometimes the universities will even be against it (thery will show support, but they won't fund you http://fsae.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_mad.gif).

So all participation is voluntary and there's really no pressure.

So when people show up, you're expecting people ready for work, ready to contribute anyway they can.

And what you get?

I'll tell ya what you get.

You get 10-sth people bugging you and stalling you, nit understanding what you're asking them, contributing absolutely nothing to the designs and on top of that being bitchy "cauz' things ain't how they expected them to be" !!!



So how do we deal with this?
How do you deal with a person (or a team of persons for that matter) that signs up for something and then just do everything humanly possible to piss you off and hold you back?

Now, that's a challenge right there...

[alumasteel]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">from what I hear FSAE is pretty much standard proceedure for most (if not all) universities out there -even obligatory some times (?). </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

That actually couldn't be farther from the truth. Not only is FSAE not "standard procedure", but many universities only "tolerate" FSAE programs because it can be a drain on their resources (space, machine time, class attendance, GPA, etc.). And it's not all that common to get even emotional support from the department, let alone any monetary support. It's just the price of playing the game, really.

As far as the original topic is concerned: my biggest mistake as the leader of the suspension subteam my senior year was not keeping up with the progress of the team members early on in the design process. The ideal situation is where the team leader has a very clear goal and knows how to get to that goal, and then they guide the other team members (this is one of the traits of a good manager for a "real world" company). If the team leader is just learning how to design a suspension system/chassis/powertrain/whatever else, then that can be very difficult. However, the point of the project is to do just that.. learn. So sometimes the real life business model isn't practical and you have to get creative.

Bottom line is that there isn't a magic secret to motivating people to work on a voluntary project, but effective communication with the team is key. And you also have to be able manage the different levels of commitment. If someone is only able to devote a few hours a week, figure out a role to fit them and they will be productive. If someone comes in and creates tabs for a few hours, that's a few man-hours of labor taken off the shoulders of the dedicated members.

Lastly, try not to take yourself or the project too seriously, it really is an educational project. While winning a competition would be great, in the end what you're going to take away is the invaluable experiences (professional and otherwise) and the very close friendship with the other dedicated members. 10 years from now you're not going to care what place you came in at competition.

[Bemo]

In our case the work in the team is also completely voluntary and you don't get any degrees or something from the university.
In the case of DonMolina it sounds like a lot of people don't really know what the work in the team is like when they enter it.
It is important that new members know what it is about. Every year a lot of people come to us and want to join the team, but after we tell them how much work it is there are only a few left. These are the people you need to build the car.

And what several people here already mentioned, it is most important to have some team activities which aren't about FSAE. You must have fun together and feel as a team.
If you're just the evil boss who's yelling at everybody if things don't go well, people won't be motivated to spend biggest parts of their free time in the team.

[MalcolmG]

jeez, this topic must come up every month or something! It's been said a few times, but I'm going to re-iterate - the best way to get people motivated is to make them feel welcome, and try and create a group of people that are all buddies. Once they start enjoying being out at the workshop doing things, they'll become more involved in the project and the motivation to put in more work will grow. Sometimes throwing people into the deep end with responsibility can be good as well.

Once you have people committed/motivated, the hard part is making them effective and managing the project carefully to ensure you achieve your goals.

Someone mentioned a team who has financial incentives from their university to achieve certain deadlines - that's us. For what it's worth, I believe the benefit of this is nothing to do with motivating team members, because I'd be surprised if more than about 10-20% of the team really cared about the financial side of things - what it does very, very well is set deadlines in stone, and prevent the management from edging deadlines further back rather than doing what they should be doing to ensure they're met - ie planning more thoroughly through the year, and making those hard decisions about design changes etc that are often required to ensure the car is finished on time.