Leadership Roles - Past and Present

Full Team Captain - responsible for the overall vision and operations within the team, coordinating between subteams and mentors; duties include
- Overseeing all subteam tasks and projects
- Coordinating and leading full team meetings (shared with Team Impact Captain)
- Acting as the team’s representative for alliance selection, awards ceremonies, media interviews, and other public-facing events
- Working directly with mentors and other captains to determine team commitments, schedules, and priorities
- Actively working to improve the team and its interests, including recommending and implementing process improvements, establishing appropriate goals, and considering both long and short-term impact
- Leading the Woodie Flowers Finalist Award submission
- MUST HAVE - a clear vision for the team, the ability to execute a vision, and strong oral and written communication skills
Team Impact Captain - responsible for the overall vision and operations outside of the team, coordinating between subteams and mentors; duties include
- Organization and execution of Impact Award pieces, including the executive summaries, essay, video, and presentation
- Outreach visioning and coordination
Build Subteam Captain - responsible for mechanical aspects of the team; duties include
- Ensuring robots are in working order for demonstrations
- Overseeing all mechanical projects to ensure they are completed on time
- Identifying subteam tasks and assigning them to subteam members
- Guiding subteam members for task completion (demonstrating proper technique and safety methods, assisting in choosing parts and materials, and sharing how to ask for help)
- Review, update, and present training materials for new students
- MUST HAVE - broad knowledge of proper use of tools and materials, understanding of design process and mechanical concepts, understanding of robot rules, independent execution of build tasks, ability to forecast task completion timelines and relative difficulty
CAD/CAM Expert - responsible for final review of models prior to machining or manufacturing; significant participation in the creation of initial prototypes and robot designs as part of the build leadership team
Programming subteam captain - responsible for programming/coding aspects of the team; duties include
- Ensuring robots are in working order for demonstrations
- Overseeing programming/coding projects to ensure they are completed on time
- Know the entire competition robot code and be able to troubleshoot and fix code issues in any subsystem.
- Overall management of GitHub branches for competition code.
- Review and update training materials for new students.
- MUST HAVE - the ability to troubleshoot robot connectivity and have an understanding of robot programming
Autonomous Expert - Significant participation in the creation, testing, and updating of autonomous code for the competition robot
Media Subteam Captain - responsible for all photo, video, and multimedia content for the team; duties include
- Ensuring that all cameras and media equipment (including any editing software subscription services) are in working order for the season
- Overseeing processes, including but not limited to
  - Video visioning/storyboarding, compilation, and editing
  - Content collection, uploads/organization, and use
  - Deadline management as it relates to regular communication (posting, school updates, sponsor updates, etc.) and projects
- Coordinating with team leadership to ensure that the visioning for the team is executed through media/outward-facing content
- Review, update, and present training materials for new students, including but not limited to topics pertaining
  - Camera Use (competition/event photos, as well as general use)
  - Photo/Video Editing Platforms
  - Media Types/Editing Options on Social Media Platforms
  - Community Audience and Stakeholders
- MUST HAVE
  - Understanding of proper use of equipment and software/web outlets
    - Select standard programs that will be used for each medium
  - Awareness of organization deadlines (award submissions, build season timelines, etc.)
  - Ability to set task completion timelines (breaking down projects into smaller tasks) based on relative difficulty
  - Delegation skills based on team member strengths/interests
  - Strong organizational skills
  - Well-rounded knowledge of the full team and its separate subteams/parts
Strategy task force lead- responsible for robot and game strategy decisions, including scouting and design team; duties include
- Leading the team’s scouting efforts at events, including ensuring that all preparation for scouting before events is completed
- Leading the team’s game strategy decisions as the chief member of the design team
- Ensuring the build and programming subteams’ activities remain in alignment with the overall game strategy
- Being an expert on the game manual to provide guidance to the team on rules questions
- Working with the full team captain to choose alliance partners at events
- MUST HAVE - understanding of the design process and high-level robot design concepts, knowledge of the scouting app and experience implementing this system, high level of interest in robot and game strategy, adaptability, and strong oral and written communication skills

Captain candidates interview for a team leadership position. Students are able to indicate preferences based on current leadership roles (e.g. full team captain, strategy captain, programming subteam captain, build subteam captain), and may be encouraged to fill another position based on their strengths and team needs. Similarly, student strengths and team needs may create a new leadership position previously not advertised. No student is forced to take an undesired leadership position, and the team benefits from having a variety of student leadership strengths and perspectives.

Occasionally, two candidates may be selected to be co-captains (e.g. build subteam co-captains). KnightKrawler avoids putting two students together as co-captains unless both agree they can work well together. Such scenarios include when there are two ideal candidates or when two candidates have complementary strengths.

The role descriptions above are general, as each student leader has brought their own unique skills and strengths to the role. Please reach out to a mentor or current captain if you have questions about any of the descriptions listed. Current student leaders are also a wonderful resource of information on what each role entails.