Attracting and Retaining Members

[Dominic Venieri]

Question for all teams out there:

How do you guys go about attracting and retaining new members each year?

Every year, our student union hosts an activities fair, usually the 2nd week of classes, where all the campus clubs and organizations set up booths/exhibits in one place (happens to be our hockey arena). We set ourselves up there in the lobby, and get a sign up sheet going. This year and last year, we collected over 100 names/emails. Then a week later, we have an informational meeting in one of the lecture halls. Half the people will show up. Then, people show up to our regular weekly meetings and such.

So, we've got about 6 new members, 4 juniors/seniors, and only 2 freshmen.

I'm just wondering how you guys keep freshmen especially interested in the program. A lot of guys here get into it for a while, and then get sucked away by Greek Life, which is pretty big on our campus.

Fact is, most freshmen don't have much to offer as far as fabrication or design skills go. The first semester at least is mostly a learning experience. We have classroom style sessions in the shop on welding, sheet metal fab, machining, etc.

Maybe we're just in a slump, or maybe our underclassmen are just lame, or maybe we're doing something wrong.

I'm just curious to see what you guys think and how you address the sitation.

www.formularpi.com (http://www.formularpi.com)

[Dominic Venieri]

Question for all teams out there:

How do you guys go about attracting and retaining new members each year?

Every year, our student union hosts an activities fair, usually the 2nd week of classes, where all the campus clubs and organizations set up booths/exhibits in one place (happens to be our hockey arena). We set ourselves up there in the lobby, and get a sign up sheet going. This year and last year, we collected over 100 names/emails. Then a week later, we have an informational meeting in one of the lecture halls. Half the people will show up. Then, people show up to our regular weekly meetings and such.

So, we've got about 6 new members, 4 juniors/seniors, and only 2 freshmen.

I'm just wondering how you guys keep freshmen especially interested in the program. A lot of guys here get into it for a while, and then get sucked away by Greek Life, which is pretty big on our campus.

Fact is, most freshmen don't have much to offer as far as fabrication or design skills go. The first semester at least is mostly a learning experience. We have classroom style sessions in the shop on welding, sheet metal fab, machining, etc.

Maybe we're just in a slump, or maybe our underclassmen are just lame, or maybe we're doing something wrong.

I'm just curious to see what you guys think and how you address the sitation.

www.formularpi.com (http://www.formularpi.com)

[Michael Jones]

We're a bit more formal in the process - we have two formal recruiting drives, one in September, one in April. A week or so of showing off and talking people up on campus, two or three information sessions, and then an application and interview process.

We get about 80 people interested in the fall, about 50 in the spring. Half of these stick around for the full process, and we pick about 6-8 people each time.

We're moving towards spring recuirting primarily now, though. Spring recruits are exceptionally high quality since they aren't just shopping around for things to do this year. And, they go to competition and gain that experience so they hit the ground running in September, whereas the fall recruits take a lot longer to warm up and aren't usually fully effective for a couple of months. The exception to this is M.Eng recruiting, since by definition we only know who they are in August and they're only around for a year.

As for freshmen, we're reluctant to recruit them but we have brought one or two on a year. It's a learning curve, absolutely - they require a bit more attention and patience, but the results after three/four years are usually stellar. Our current engine leader, our 2002 electronics leader and our 2001 manpower leader were freshmen initially. They never outgrow the stigma either.

Recruiting sophomores in the spring gives people 2+ years; probably as much as you can expect to squeeze from people, and the learning curve isn't as steep.

Also consider recruiting from outside engineering. We're actively looking for business folk right now since those in charge this year aren't going to be around next year and/or want to do design primarily instead. We'll be primarily looking in the economics/commerce/industrial relations/communication domains there. Also looking to recruit EEs for the same reason. Consider recruiting as a medium-to-long term effort - not necessarily what they'll do in May 2003, but in May 2004.

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Cornell Racing
http://fsae.mae.cornell.edu

[vinHonda]

Toronto does similarly what you mentioned.

No, not the interview process!!! That's pretty intimidating!

However, we have open lines of communication, give them tries at different things. We also let them know the step by step process of what is going to happen. Basically the whole team is informed. Our race shop is pretty cool to hang out in.... so this year, we've attracted a lot of dedicated freshmen. The hard part is holding their hands and doing your own stuff. Just try your best, that's the only way teams stay good year after year...... *cough, Cornell!*

Whutz up Mike?

Vinh

University of Toronto Formula SAE Racing Team
www.fsae.utoronto.ca (http://www.fsae.utoronto.ca)

[Michael Jones]

quote from Vinh:

No, not the interview process!!! That's pretty intimidating!

***

Agreed, and I'm not convinced we do the best job of it - we've missed out on some fine people (one guy we rejected 5 times before finally accepting him; turned out to be an excellent team member in the end) and accepted our share of duds (who we have trouble getting rid of unless they take the initiative to leave themselves.)

It would be nice to find a better way to encourage truly motivated people to show up and get involved regardless. As the guy who was rejected 5 times noted, once you've been rejected, it's highly unlikely that you'll hang out, work overtime and kiss everyone's ass to try to get on. Yet, admittedly, we seem to expect that.

What we have done is target some people that we do reject in interviews to really make the effort to show up and get on. We call it this yukiing, after our engine leader Yuki who pioneered the process his freshman year. Essentially, he kept showing up and never went away. Yukiing hasn't worked too well yet, but we've created a new verb, so that's cool.

Essentially, there's no replacement for a highly motivated, barely sane hardcore team member. And they tend to find you vs. the other way around. Our current organization/manpower leader was trying to break into our lab while we were still deliberating after interviews. Someone had to run out and tell him he was on the team and to chill out a bit.

Hey Vinh...in lieu of money for tire data, perhaps we arrange a trade...shock dyno testing, a month of Yuki's services and a draft pick to be named later?

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Cornell Racing
http://fsae.mae.cornell.edu

[Charlie]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Essentially, there's no replacement for a highly motivated, barely sane hardcore team member. And they tend to find you vs. the other way around. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Could not agree more. I've seen Auburn's team grow from 1 returning member in 1999 (a 2000 team of 7 freshman and 2 sophomores) to more than 25 members.

I am of the opinion that the good people DO come to you, but only if they know about you and see the program as exciting. So do whatever you can to increase your level of exposure. Get shirts made and wear them. Make your shop look exciting and professional. Make posters for around campus. You still need recruiting drives, but after they know about you, they will stay motivated if they want to. Make sure they have something to do, and some will get it done and others won't. They will realize it's work and leave if they are not motivated, not much you can do about that.

-Charlie Ping
Auburn University FSAE 1999-present
http://www.auburn.edu/~pingiii/2002FSAE/carblank.jpg

[vinHonda]

Mike! hahaahha!

Forget Cornell's custom shocks this year....we made our own in-house shock dyno!!! I'm kidding!...Arvin Meritor dyno's our shocks!

However, Matt and I both would love to get Yuki's services for a month! Pick his brain about some stuff; I hear he's done some interestin work w/ some FNippon, etc.

HAHAHAHHAH!!!!! FSAE trading!

I'll give you...... 5 dedicated new guys, for the inside scoop on your anti-ackermann!!!

Vinh


Hey Vinh...in lieu of money for tire data, perhaps we arrange a trade...shock dyno testing, a month of Yuki's services and a draft pick to be named later?

University of Toronto Formula SAE Racing Team
www.fsae.utoronto.ca (http://www.fsae.utoronto.ca)

[Michael Jones]

Actually had a discussion about something like this...FSAE as an intercollegiate sport, complete with academic scholarships, under-the-table bonuses, TV contracts, poaching from schools, cults of personalities built around advisors and star drivers, trash talking, propping up duds and suppressing injuries in the press to increase their use as trade bait...

Until that evil day, I'm in contact with the Raelians re: Yuki clones. If we get a few, we'll exchange one for tire data.

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Cornell Racing
http://fsae.mae.cornell.edu

[vinHonda]

HAHAH! Tv deals!

Mike, how about 2 Yuki clones for Avon tire data at 2 camber settings? 1.5 and 0 degrees?

Throw in one of those custom shocks too, and we'll send over some free carbon panels!

Vinh

University of Toronto Formula SAE Racing Team
www.fsae.utoronto.ca (http://www.fsae.utoronto.ca)

[EliseS2]

Like everyone we have over 50 people showing intrest at the beginning of the year. We are lucky that we get one decent person out of it. Our program was in its death throws last year. We only had one member carry over from the previous year. We did not have a car anywhere near running. The carryover member was a junior had not yet even gone to the competition, because his only year being on the team the car was not finished. So last year we had to fight the school to keep our small workshop (20X12). We owed a bank money because we overcharged our account. It was basiclly me(a freshman), the carryover member ( a junior), and another member (a sophmore) that could not be counted on to show up, but was useful. We were always looking for money and could not afford anything we needed. OUr machine shop has machines left over from WWII, they have War Department stamps on them.

I could not think of better situation. Since sophmore year of high school I would read anything that I could about FSAE. When I toured schools, I would always find the SAE team, it was hard over the summer. I would hate to be on one of these 20+ member teams. I would be that little freshman that knew nothing. I would be lost in the shuffle. Now on this team I have had a hand in about everysystem, even electrical when I am a mech major. I have learned so much. We have gained one good recruit about a week ago. Our car is about done and unless the building burns down, it will be running by first week of febuary (that is using the pi rule).

[Michael Jones]

quote:
***
I would hate to be on one of these 20+ member teams. I would be that little freshman that knew nothing. I would be lost in the shuffle. Now on this team I have had a hand in about everysystem, even electrical when I am a mech major. I have learned so much.
***

For the truly hardcore, you're right - a small team gives you the chance to learn everything about everything. However, I remain convinced that the project is both sufficiently complex and demanding that more is better...up to a point.

At about 27 full time members, we're a bit on the large side, but we still find things for people to do...people can specialize in parts/systems of their choosing, which is a more efficient way of building expertise.

It's more administratively complex, especially with respect to system integration issues. So, we have people who focus on systems engineering, administration, organizational learning and communication.

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Cornell Racing
http://fsae.mae.cornell.edu

[ODUformulaRacer]

I would say a different in concerns of freshman on the team, all the guys I have are more than willing to learn which makes them great for researching. Two of my freshman this year have really helped out, one got to brand new computers donated and the other found us 4130 super cheap. Being a new team I really can't pick and choose members like some of you larger teams but I have a group of about 20 guys who put everything they've got into their work. I came to this team from our Legends racing team this year and ended up with the position of project manager/ captain. One thing I know from all the other types of racing I've done is that experience is better than anything else and the only way to get that is time.

2003 Project Manager
ODU Formula SAE

[Paul Dansereau]

Hi All,
This is obviously a challenge that ever team faces, some more than others. As director of our crew for the past two years these are the things that I have focused on to optimize the dropout rate:

- Communication, #1 for sure. If people don't know whats going on they will become ambivalent and just drift away. They've generally got better things to do, or so it will seem.

- Consistency, have REGULAR meetings. Our various groups meet on there own but we have regular general meetings sat.'s to bring at least one person in the group up to date.

- Open mindedness, never turn anyone away. People will generally want to join throughout the year, let them.

- Keep people busy. If/when people come out meetings make sure they have something to do. This should be taken care of the individual group leaders, but inevitably there are people standing around. At the very least get them talking about an open issue.

Initially I refered to this as an "optimization", the reason I say that is because there are some people you would be better off without....

There are more, and probably better ways, but this is what we've done.

Hope it helps

[Michael Jones]

quote:

***
Initially I refered to this as an "optimization", the reason I say that is because there are some people you would be better off without....
***

Agreed, and one thing we've had problems with in the past. Some people are just poor fits with team culture and some can even sabotage progress and morale with their attitude, work ethic, inattention to quality, etc. We tend to give these people relatively high latitude - they have to go out of the way to prove themselves problematic - but we've been less good at "firing" people than perhaps we should have been. Usually, though, people see the writing on the wall and leave voluntarily, which we appreciate.

Communication is indeed #1, and I'm not just saying that to justify my joke of a degree. :-)

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Cornell Racing
http://fsae.mae.cornell.edu

[ODUformulaRacer]

we setup a yahoo groups website to keep the team up to date. you can post documents, setup a calender, and communicate with all the team members at once. you can also make it a members only site to keep documents confidential
nick

2003 Project Manager
ODU Formula SAE

[Michael Jones]

We run our own LAN with internal mailing lists - mostly subteam lists, all of which get copied to leaders automatically so they can follow what's going on. A couple of generic lists for all, and a sort of by-request humor list that keeps nasty comments away from advisors and serves as an informal alumni network. It's a pretty dynamic system. Lots of communication flow. Way too much. I've been on leaders for 3.5 years now for my research - about 18,000 emails so far. I'd say I'm responsible for 10% of that. :-)

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Cornell Racing
http://fsae.mae.cornell.edu

[D Mack - CMT]

Hey guys, im from a fledgling team in Australia. We are just starting and our problem with this topic is way greater than yours. You at least have other years to give you tips.

The yahoo gropus thing dosnt seem to work with our group, i dont think anyone but 3-4 people use it.

Its a bloody nightmare, i wish the uni gave us training in this rather than useless crap like...FEA, force and acceleration...oh wait.

[Dominic Venieri]

We have our own online messaging system on our website. No one on the team ever actually uses it though. It is set up that team members and alumni both can communicate with each other internally, without email. We also have a team/group/project leader section that allows them to post reports of their progress, etc. No one ever reads them except for our alumni I think. The messaging has guest features that allow any visitor to send a message to anyone by either logging in as a guest, or just by sending a message to me (without having to log in). This is used a lot by prospective students and members, and sometimes by people interested in sponsoring us.

What seems to work best is group emails.

Going back to my original post, we made up some posters a couple weeks ago, posted them all over campus. Some guys also took some around as flyers, and went "dorm storming" talking to students right there in their rooms. We managed to get about 6 new people to show up the first week, managed to keep 1. Next week, about 4 new ones showed up, kept 1. This week, another 3 or so new guys. We'll see after this weekend how many we keep.

We also got 2 other new recruits, but that had nothing to do with our posters. They were guys who had seen the car at open house/accepted students day, and a guy who saw us at a local autocross, and decided to check us out.

Mike, I'd be interested in chatting with you a bit about effective online communication tools, if you have some time.

www.formularpi.com (http://www.formularpi.com)

[Michael Jones]

Good job on the recruiting...We recently underwent a similar process to recruit new administrative/business folk, as our current team will basically be gone as of 03-04. Always good to plan ahead...

Any time you'd like to chat about various online communication tools, etc. just drop me a line...mlj8@cornell.edu here...

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Cornell Racing
http://fsae.mae.cornell.edu

[Mechanicaldan]

That's how you'll hook them, and keep them. Same deal as most above. We recruit in the Fall. Put a bunch of flyers on bulletin boards all over campus before classes start. Park the car in front of our library and ME building over lunch during the first week of classes. Get a junk engine donated from a salvage yard, and let the new guys take it apart. Go around to freshman 101 classes and give a presentation. We need to recruit more from business college and EE next year. The MEs just come automatically.

Here's one for you. Get shop shirts with people's names on them. The dark blue, short sleeve, collared shirts with a name patch above one front pocket, and the team logo above the other pocket. People have name tags, but in a cool way. People pick up names quicker, and the team members bond quicker.

Also, go go-karting together. Lots of big towns have indoor karting, so go as a team some night. Racing is fun!

We're a pretty big team this year at 30+. Managing is the tough part. How to teach new members how to use the power tools? One on one works best, but kills time for a team leader. We really need a shop manager/ new member instructor.

Cyclone Racing
Iowa State University
Engine Team Leader

[Michael Jones]

...best solution re: training a big team is to ensure that knowledge is dispersed in the first place. With a team of 30 or so, there's no reason for anyone (team leaders included) to be expert in all systems - inevitably, people will specialize based on their interests. Content experts can and should be charged with maintaining and continuing the knowledge base - particularly if they themselves are graduating and on the way out the door, in which case they should do less, teach more.

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Cornell Racing
http://fsae.mae.cornell.edu