Learn from Leaders Podcast - #5 (August, 2020): Matt Ott: Empowering Teams to Build AAA Mobile Experiences

Nov 15, 2023

#50: The state of production practices in the gaming industry

Why does the games industry still have big issues in production management and what can be done about it? Ben and Aaron discuss typical issues related to how game companies are managed today, specifically leadership in production. They advocate for how a paradigm shift in leadership can help studios bring better games faster to the market at a lower cost. Listen to learn more about how to embrace uncertainty, encourage a more adaptive, collaborative approach, and how producers can go from being stuck with task management to being facilitators of alignment. The discussion also addresses why studios get stuck in old practices at a time when increased live services make the evolution of management more needed than ever. This episode is truly great for both new and senior game industry leaders who want to take their production practices, team leadership, and studio management to the next level. Guests: Benjamin Carcich has spent the last few years helping leaders at studios of all sizes, and recently led the creation of training for game producers called "Succeeding in Game Production: What You Aren't Taught". Before that, he spent almost a decade at Riot Games shipping champions, tools, maps, and various platform and backend systems, and ended up leading discipline efforts around hiring and the role of production while teaching agile fundamentals around the world. His first job after college was as a Combat Arms officer in the U.S. Army. Aaron Smith got his film degree in southern California and started doing production work, only to realize this wasn't his tribe. He joined a tiny company called "Riot Games" and worked his way from intern to director over a decade- shipping dozens of products small and large. Now, he's a Co-Founder of Building Better Games - a company focused on helping studios scale and ship unique products by instilling leadership and quality production practices. BBG also serves game leaders looking to build their game production skill set. Building Better Games Newsletter: https://www.buildingbettergames.gg/newsletter Building Better Games Podcast: https://www.buildingbettergames.gg/podcast "Succeeding in Game Production: What You Aren't Taught" course link: https://www.buildingbettergames.gg/succeeding-in-game-production

1 hr 7 min