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Announcements
Great turnout at the WARG x Orbital x Midnight Sun social last week!
Directors have selected Branden DeHart as our new Faculty Advisor: https://uwaterloo.ca/scholar/bjdehart/home
Manager of the RoboHub
WARG member during his undergrad
Tron class of 09
Seasonal lecturer for MME, ECE and SYDE courses including ME 640 - Autonomous Mobile Robotics
Friends with FLIR people
Leads Offboarding
Aaron stepping down end of this term (F24)
Two Auto leads for next term (W25)
Maxwell & Tong are off-stream from each other right now
Tong thinking of stepping down end of W25
begin onboarding someone next term
Hardy stepping down end of this term (F24)
not sure who is interested in replacing
two EFS leads
lead interest form as outlined in Lead Promotion Process
rollout forms before midterms
Smile stepping down after comp (during S25 term)
Alison planning on stepping down during S25 term (after comp)
mech is one stream heavy
will be there for comp 2025
Smile & Alison mech leads offsite in W25 and onsite in S25
Derek stepping down end of next august (end of S25 term)
new lead for fall term
Anyone else stepping down?
We don't want anyone to feel stuck being lead, see https://uwarg-docs.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/AD/pages/2279735611/Lead+Term+Guidelines?search_id=a72a6abc-3afb-404d-8eea-619441443b8f&additional_analytics=queryHash---fe656197910d603ad62864be762c62a2010fe6f1edc5dc5cafe68482674d0f8e , if you aren’t enjoying it anymore then we want to give you the path out and facilitate a smooth transfer of power.
SDC Teams Meeting
Prep for 2024-09-25 SSDC Meeting
Review this document for leads to see.
any topics subteam leads want directors to cover that aren’t there already?
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Please fill out: Fall 2024 Eng Soc, WEEF, MEF Wishlist Items.xlsx
Due date: Friday, October 4
EFS/Auto
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Situation
Some Initial ThoughtsDirector & other leads thoughts:
Too many EFS and Auto bootcampers for leads to support could be causing strain on leads preventing them from handing out meaningful tasks.
We should not stop accepting new bootcampers.
Increase bootcamp difficulty to reduce influx?
The bootcamp doesn't prepare people for the tasks we have so making the bootcamp harder could be an approach to reduce influx and ensure people who complete the bootcamp are prepared for real tasks
Getting PMs as involved as possible is a good way to build leads
Leads for auto and EFS to provide thoughts on what they want to do
Need to keep improving
direct action items out of this meeting is the goal
If the bootcamp is hard then you’ll get people who want to do tasks rather
this is a solution for newer members
motivating current members
encouraging attending the architecture syncs and getting people to understand the usefulness of their projects
hardware & software divide
ask people to add to meeting minutes and do documentation as a way to force them to get involved with the system and be more accountable and give updates. Set expectation for members to discuss tasks
having things in writing forces people to think about it in advance
a lot of people join the team just to line their resume and not really to do anything difficult
this happens for all subteams
bootcamp is meant somewhat as a filter for people who really dont wanna do anything
ideally those who make it through the bootcamp we can find something that matches the venn diagram between “warg wants” and “individual wants”. Get people invested in the system to understand and get on board with what “warg wants” which kind of expands the venn diagram overlap.
pairing experienced and not experienced members
other subteams have had same issues of PMs not PMing, aligning on expectations is important
mech has three PMs right now
indefinite stalling on tasks
happens on mundane tasks or first task for a newer member with mech
giving deadlines (breaking things down into small tasks that take less than a week)
EFS Stuff
EFS is just getting started on the PMs stuff, lots of building to be done here
Leads are too busy to improve the bootcamp right now
Most of the stress for leads is that there’s no tasks to give out
There are enough projects, but people struggle to take them
can set expectations
Hardy onsite, Derek offsite
Lead’s don't have time to explain every technical detail
starting to do meeting minutes
modelling after other subteams
kind of do this verbally, but having it in writing might be better
no bootcamp changes at least in the near future, maybe eventually
hard to hold onto experienced members
Auto Stuff
deadlines for tasks doesn’t really work
people take on tasks then don’t really do anything
have meeting minutes already
people don't fill out meeting minutes
can’t really force them to do it
this includes PMs which is really difficult
should make expectations with PMs about the their role: https://uwarg-docs.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/AD/pages/2567962652/Project+Manager+Responsibilities?search_id=56840feb-89f0-49d5-9839-f6596acfe782&additional_analytics=queryHash---f0a184ef9691553a7ea4faa748d846f8ed45fc6909afdda462511e94a96e6af7 very clear to them, specific to the project they’re managing.
better onboarding process
implementing onboarding presentations
maybe we circle back to this in a future meeting or director syncs?
running out of time in this leads meeting
SUAS Thoughts
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Some limiting factors:
Only two batteries, max 100Wh each
Fly 15 miles
Very fixed wing focused and we are not confident in delivering a fixed wing system in time.
Airdrop payload within 20 ft of target
more obvious limiting factors;
money
time
people
Thus we cannot do SUAS this year but are keeping it on the horizon for 2026.
Advisor/Senior Role Revamp
Follow up on the roles discussion from 2024-09-17 Leads Meeting
a good last topic of the meeting bc we could discuss forever
Details fleshed out here: Discord Roles
If you have concerns feel free to express them now
there will be some hiccups in implementation obviously but we’ll figure this out
Faculty Advisor Selection ProccessProcess
Brandon Dehart has accepted the position formally.
Looking into contacting FLIR with respect to IR camera stuff
Calendar Changes
Upcoming Meetings
Topics for 2024-10-01 Leads Meeting
Architecture syncs will be critical for success.