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Hi, I'm Aimee. And I'm gonna talk to you about collaborative decision-making. We're gonna talk about what it is, why it's important, and what it looks like.

So picture this: your team has been getting ready for a classroom competition. You've been engaged in the process of deliberative practice. You've been testing out different strategy ideas, collecting data on the ideas, analyzing it, iterating, and refining to try to get the best possible strategy. Maybe you've sent out a scout to look at other teams. You've gotten a few ideas about robot build or about strategy. And now, you have to come together, all three team members, and try to decide on the best possible strategy for competing. But all three team members may have three completely different ideas. So what do you do in order to integrate them into one great strategy? That's where collaborative decision-making comes in.

Collaborative decision-making is just the way to do this successfully. The way to examine your data together, to listen carefully to each other's ideas, and to come to a great agreement. So why is this so important? Well, first of all, good collaborative decision-making teams are going to be the better, more solid competitors, because you're gonna be combining each other's ideas into one great idea. But also, collaborative decision-making is really important for your life in general. I cannot even think of a single job that you would have as a grown-up where you wouldn't need to do some form of collaborative decision-making. So this is a skill you can practice now that will serve you well into the future.

All right, so what does collaborative decision-making look like? First of all, each team member needs a chance to share his or her idea before a decision is made. So that means if you're the sharing person, you're gonna share your idea and you're gonna back it up with data: data from your testing, data from your engineering notebook. If you are a listener, then you need to make sure that you are actively listening and understanding your teammate. You wanna refrain from interrupting until your team member has had a full chance to share their idea. And if you don't understand, it is your responsibility to ask questions until you really get their idea fully.

One thing you can do, if you're not totally sure you understand someone's idea, is explain it back to them and ask them to listen and clarify that you're understanding what they meant. If not, go ahead, continue to ask questions until you've got it down. It's really important to understand each other well. Probably, your final strategy is gonna be a combination of all three team members' ideas based on data that you've collected, based on your engineering notebook.

Now, sometimes it's difficult to come to this agreement. And what if you can't? What if you're really struggling as a team to agree on a good strategy? It's okay. It's gonna happen. And you're just gonna keep working through it with this process of collaborative decision-making. The most important thing is that you disagree respectfully and productively. You wanna use a calm and a matter-of-fact tone of voice. You wanna acknowledge the good parts of the strategy that you may not like all of, and then let them know you have concerns with some parts of it. Give them a chance to back up their reasoning with their data and a chance for everyone to weigh in on the strategy. Keep making compromises until everyone can agree.

If you keep working through it, I bet you'll come up with a fantastic strategy for winning the competition. But if you really can't come to an agreement after an extended period of working on it, go ahead and raise your hand, talk to your teacher about it. I bet they're gonna have a great idea for how to resolve your stalemate.

All right, so collaborative decision-making is key to your team's success.

If you come together to make a plan for your competition, share your ideas, and listen and understand actively, disagree respectfully, and eventually come to agreement; you're gonna end up with a stronger strategy, a better chance of winning, and you're gonna have a whole lot more fun in the process.

So go out there and collaborate.

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Thank you for your attention and enthusiasm. We wish you the best of luck in your competition. Remember, teamwork makes the dream work!