Success Through Teamwork

Guest post by Manuel Dussault Gomez

“Unity is strength; when there is teamwork and collaboration, wonderful things can be achieved.”

This is one of my favourite quotes about engineering and life in general because it’s 100% true.

Designing and building a one person human-powered submarine was a team effort from a number of people, and it’s the passion from everyone that kept the project alive from day one.

In past blog posts I mentioned the seven main reasons why the Submarine Racing Club is successful, which include the ability to sell yourself or an idea, negotiation, social media, hard work, willingness to move forward, persistence, and collaboration. This post will focus on the last four which include hard work, willingness to move forward, persistence and the most important one, COLLABORATION.

Hard Work

If you want to be successful, you have to work harder than everyone else around you, period. When you are trying to achieve a big goal like acquiring a university degree, starting a business, or getting in better physical condition, you have to put in extra hours into your work.

You might think to yourself that there are simply not enough hours in the day to achieve everything that you want to do, but I am here to tell you that it is all possible if you work hard, sacrifice some of your precious sleep, and do not get distracted. The key thing to remember is that whatever you are sacrificing for success is not permanent. It is only temporary, and you will soon have free time to do whatever you want.

Note that this lifestyle is NOT SUSTAINABLE, and if you want to work like this you need to manage your time effectively to include a “recharging” session for your energy. A tip I recommend to everyone is to have an activity or a trip that you look forward to at the end of your day. For me it was planning incredible adventures in the little breaks I had from school. These adventures mostly included hiking, sailing, and overall enjoying nature.

Recharging

Nature is full of energy, and by appreciating everything in your surroundings you effectively ground yourself to earth and “recharge” yourself for another session of hard work. These “recharging” sessions can be as simple as going to sailing practice every week, climbing Mount Doug or even hiking the Juan de Fuca trail.

Every successful person has their own “recharging” ritual, and I strongly encourage you to find yours and practice it every now and then when you are feeling low in energy. If you are constantly “recharging” yourself you will be able to work harder and harder every single week.

Willingness to Move Forward

Hard work is a skill driven by the willingness to move forward. Not everyone in this world has the character to be successful, and only the strongest competitive minds get to claim the tittles of success and happiness. The willingness to move forward is a feeling that runs strictly on your competitive side. If you are competitive, you will work harder than everyone to be the best.

Here’s an example. Picture yourself in a room full of people. Everyone has different skills, and they are all extremely smart. What I typically do is analyze everyone in the room and choose the smartest, strongest individual. Once I know who the strongest and smartest individual is, I work as hard as possible to beat the individual that I have chosen in every single aspect of life.

When presented with obstacles, my willingness to move forward will motivate me to keep going in order to achieve my main goal, which is to be the best individual in the room. It is this competitive nature that separates the weak from the strong, and if you don’t have a will to move forward, you will get stuck somewhere undesirable.

Collaboration

In the process of trying to be the best, there will always be obstacles too big for you to overcome, and the only way to overcome these obstacles is by collaborating with someone and being persistent in order to achieve your main goal.

Collaboration is the main driving force behind every major project, including the UVic Submarine Racing Club (UVSRC). The absolute main reason the UVSRC has achieved so much in so little time is because of how many people collaborated in the project.

Picture yourself in the same room as before full of extremely smart people. If I were to give a super complicated task to everyone in the room to do alone, no one would complete the task. If I encourage collaboration, though, the task would be solved with no problem.

It takes a lot of project management skills to effectively assemble a team and achieve a goal. Not everyone is good working in teams, and I wish that everyone knew how easy life is if you collaborate with someone.

If you haven’t done so, find yourself a team for the remainder of your studies at UVic or elsewhere. Find yourself a “study buddy,” and you will notice how extremely easy it is to accomplish everything. If you do not have a study buddy join a club, and look for the perfect compatible person to spend your time and split your tasks with.

The UVic Submarine Racing Club has 92 members, and within the club, I’ve seen a number of groups getting together to complete all school related tasks. Watching all of these people work together outside of the club scene has given me great happiness, and I only hope that this community I have built remains on campus for a long time.