Judging Interview Guide

This is our guide on how to have a smooth, efficient judging interview:

Practice before the day of the competition. Have parents, friends, and volunteers ask you common interview questions and work with your teammates to get everyone to practice together.

Don't talk over one another. Let each person on the team speak; it's not a one person effort. If you have a point you want to make, wait until others have stopped speaking and avoid cutting each other off.

Be respectful to the judges. Thank them for interviewing you, do not use crude language or jokes, and be kind to everyone involved in the interview.

Have everyone familiar with the logbook. Even if it's primarily written by only one or two people, take time before the competition to familiarize the team with the logbook and how it's structured.

Don't lie. There's a misconception that to have a successful interview, you need to make your team sound perfect and act like you've never messed up. Judges love to hear about failures and how you've improved and learned from mistakes. People can tell when you're being genuine.

No matter how many awards you've gotten, don't be cocky. Nobody wants to interview a team for it to be 10 minutes of narcissism. Don't brag; everyone has room for improvement and that should be the focus.

Have a central point to the interview. Discuss it with your team before hand. We like to pick topics like 'planning' 'effective' 'logical' or 'coherent'. Throughout the interview, discuss how each step of your design process relates to this central point- for example, you could talk about how all of the code is planned out, how all of the building is planned out, how all the scouting is planned out, and how it helps your progress.

Don't act stiff. Judges aren't there to interrogate you. Just imagine- the judges that might appear scary have outside lives, families, and have senses of humor. There's no reason to freeze up.

It's okay to ask to reschedule an interview. Judges understand how crazy competitions can be- asking for a specific time can help them know when to come back, just be flexible with the recommendations.

Ask for tips and critique after the competition and really listen to what the judges have to say. Most judges are willing to help out as much as they can, and knowing what to focus on can improve competitions in the future!

Have a good time! Don't overthink it or beat yourself up if you mess up- just learn for the future!

Exercises to help you loosen up for an interview

(helpful for shy or uncertain team members)

1. Gibberish interview!

Have one team member agree to practice as the judge, and have the rest of the team be in the interview. Conduct the interview as normal- but nobody is allowed to speak a known language. Point to aspects of the robot, gesture, and let each team member speak, but don't let anyone speak comprehensible English. It feels silly, but it helps the team practice letting each person have a turn, the sorts of body language and inflections that each person should have, and lets people get used to interview format without the pressure of answering real questions.

2. 30 second dash

This can be done with two or more people. One person must be the timekeeper and topic writer, and the other person/people practice speaking without sounding unsure. The timekeeper will give the first person a topic. For 30 seconds, they must talk about this topic without using "uh" or "um" and sound confident. Start people off with easy, non-robotics topics, such as "would you rather have a pet dragon or a pet dinosaur" and over time, begin to focus on robotics topics such as "what's the best and worst thing about your team dynamic" this will help ease team members into being able to talk about robotics with someone in a more interview style dynamic instead of a conversation while sounding confident.

3. Love it or hate it

This is an exercise with 2 team members, each taking turns being the speaker. The first speaker decides on a topic- something that they really like or really dislike. Then, for 30-45 seconds, they talk about their topic as if they love it more than anything else- regardless of if they like or dislike it. They should try to have enthusiasm, appreciation, and excitement when they talk. Then, the other person guesses whether they really do love the subject, or if it was a trick. If the second person guesses right, they get a point. If not, the first person gets a point. This goes back and forth until someone is at 5 points.

4. Infomercial

Have the team present the robot and code to a mock judge like a cheesy 90's infomercial. Have cheesy, peppy slogans and action showing what the robot does. This helps bring life into actual interviews by changing how the team perceives the robot in the context of judging itself and can be a fun team building exercise!

Page updated

Google Sites

Report abuse