Capstone Project Wiki

As an experienced engineer you have skills and resources to help the team throughout the project. You can do this by adjusting the scope, providing resources, helping with technical work, facilitating communication, and advising on creating artifacts.

Help adjust the scope as appropriate

Before the project was accepted, Capstone evaluated the project and decided that the scope looked appropriate. However, you will soon know much more about the project than the Capstone staff. As you come to understand the project, you may realize that the scope needs to be adjusted for the project to be successful. Please do your best to help the team negotiate an appropriate scope.

The scope should require about 600 to 800 student hours of work. It should also include design, build, and test. If the scope is too small, the team will not be challenged enough and fail to reach the educational objectives. If the scope is too large, the project will not be completed and both the sponsor and the students will be dissatisfied.

Remember that the project should be scoped to allow the team to finish system refinement by the end of Winter semester. If events cause this to appear unlikely, please help the team work with the sponsor to adjust the scope as soon as possible. It is often most effective for the coach to contact the sponsor individually (rather than with the team) and discuss scope concerns. The changes in scope can then be finalized in conference calls or meetings between the team and the sponsor.

The scope as negotiated should be captured in the Project Success Agreement. Please help and encourage the students to create and maintain an accurate, up-to-date PSA.

Finding resources

Students are very bright and capable, but they are relatively inexperienced. They may feel that they need to complete the project entirely with resources in their team. As an experienced engineer, you can help them see that resources from outside the team can greatly increase the team's capabilities.

Equipment

Equipment is available for checkout from within the university and for rent or purchase from outside the university. If a piece of specialized equipment is needed to help the team move forward, coordinate with the Capstone office to help the team find a way to get the needed equipment.

People

People with skills and knowledge are some of the most valuable resources to a team. Help the team by sharing people from your network that may be able to assist. Help the team find ways of locating people who can give advice or suggestions for their project.

Budget

Students are used to working on a shoestring and making do. If the proper supplies would make a difference in the project, help the team to recognize this and acquire the proper supplies. Don't let the team spin their wheels when spending a little money would get them moving. Additionally, Students sometimes avoid spending money until nearly the end of the project, and then spend it unwisely trying to catch up at the end. Help them try to see that they should buy what they need when they need it!

All expenditures must be approved by you and all Capstone financial policies must be followed. Please be familiar with the purchasing policies in the Project Wiki and help your students follow them. Help them realize that ALL companies have their own purchasing policies and learning to follow them will help them in their careers.

If the cost of materials for your project will exceed the allocated Capstone budget of $1,500, the sponsor must agree to pay for any additional materials before you purchase them. Work with Capstone's Sponsor Liaisons if the budget needs to be adjusted and assist your team in following the process outlined in Project Budget. Your objective in this process are to encourage the team to work towards receiving additional budget and ensure the satisfaction of the sponsor.

Technical work

Chances are you have technical capability or expertise in the area of your assigned project. But even if you don't, you were chosen as a coach because you have technical expertise beyond that of the student team. Apply your expertise to the project to help the team succeed.

Help the team get started

One of the hardest things for students to do is to get started on a new technical challenge. There are no sample problems for them to look at; there is no answer key; there's not even a textbook for most projects. In the face of this uncertainty, it's easy to postpone getting started.

If you can help students get started, it will break down their fear of the unknown. And you will not only help them with this project, but you'll be showing them a pattern they can use throughout their lives.

Don't take over

In helping them get started, it's important not to take over the project. It must not become your project, even if you could do it easily. The goal of Capstone is not just to get the project done, it's to educate students in the process. So you must help the students, rather than doing it for them.

One effective way to accomplish this is to find the student who is to be responsible for the task and ask to sit with them while you get started. As the two of you work together, you can demonstrate what you're doing and help them get up to speed. You can then give her coaching as they try to move forward on the foundation you've created.

Whether you use this system or another, don't let the team's project become your personal project.

Provide technical advice

As a coach, it's important for you to provide technical advice, especially when it's asked for. You have significant experience; you should use that experience to guide the team.

Sometimes the team doesn't really want advice. In such cases, you may be best able to provide advice by asking questions. And sometimes, when you ask the questions, you'll find out that your advice is wrong.

Regardless of how you provide the advice, don't leave the team to flail about because of a lack of technical advice.

Communication

Students are likely to think that reporting on what they have done is not nearly as important as the work they are doing. Of course, you are aware that work is not of value until it has been conveyed to the necessary people. As you help the students learn this vital principle, you'll be doing them a great service.

The following are some ways that the team needs to convey their work to the sponsor.

Weekly sponsor contact

The team should spend a few minutes in live (in-person, by phone, by Skype, etc.) conversation with the liaison each week. The live conversation allows communication that goes beyond the words and captures nuances. These conversations will help keep the team energized and active and the sponsor satisfied.

If weekly contact with the sponsor stops, this is an indication that things are going wrong or are about to go wrong on the project. You should be very concerned if this happens.

Weekly status updates

Each week the team should email a status update to the sponsor, as described in Weekly Status Updates. Some teams will be tempted to skip the emailed update, believing that the live conversation replaces the written update. Please help them to see that the two forms of communication are different.

It is often profitable to have the live conversation the day after the status update is sent, so that the team and the sponsor have something specific to discuss, instead of just generalities.

Project Success Agreement

Perhaps the most important communication between the sponsor and the team is the PSA. Please help the team write an excellent PSA that truly captures the sponsor's wishes, so there is no tension between getting a grade and working on the project.

As the key success measures change, help the team to get the changes approved and put in writing. Having them in writing avoids misunderstanding and surprises.

Creating Artifacts

Artifacts convey the most important information about the design. They represent the primary means of communicating their design to the sponsor. Help your team to understand the importance of artifacts, to choose the best artifacts for their project, and to create high-quality artifacts. Your team should make a practice of attaching artifacts to the weekly status reports as they are completed.

Design Review Packages

When the team has completed their project and left BYU, the only thing remaining from their project is the set of design review packages. Help students understand that they need to create packages that are valuable and help them make their packages excellent.

You should expect students to get early drafts of their packages to you well in advance and give feedback to the team.

Presentations

The presentations given at the end of each semester are the most visible public exposure for the projects. Please work with the team to help their presentation match the quality of the work and of the students as individuals.

You should have the team do at least one dry run with you, so you can help them focus and polish the presentation.