#studio management

No, but that’s hilarious.

You asked me what I learned about work, or about craft, from those experiences. I learned that we have a mental hierarchy in our society about what type of work we think is important. That mental hierarchy doesn’t value the effort people put forth in doing the work. That concept has very much stuck with me. I learned how fast our society would crumble if what we thought of as “service jobs” would stop. Our society would just stop working. I don’t think a lot of people are aware of that. Also, the amount of care that you bring to your work- no matter what it is that you’re doing- has an enormous effect on the outcome. It can be hard to care about something; not everything is fun. Not everything in game design is fun. If you can find a way to bring your best skill, mindset, and craft to the task, the outcome is going to improve. And it doesn’t matter if you’re designing systems, or folding towels.

From college, how did you get into the games industry?

 At UNM I was a photography major, and I had all this expensive photography equipment. If I wasn’t playing games, I was spending the rest of my time walking around and taking pictures. The idea was for me to graduate and move to New York City to be a high-end photo printer for fashion photographers and others. I wanted to print advertising collateral. The summer before my senior year my apartment was broken into and they stole all my photography equipment. Even now, the amount of equipment they stole would be difficult to replace. But back then, as a college student on work-study and Pell grants, it was devastating.

Absolutely!

There was no way I could finish the senior thesis I had planned. So, I had to quickly scramble to see what exactly I was going to do. A friend of mine said that she was going to interview at this software development company with a guy who attended our high school. She heard my plight and told me to come along. I went, and it turns out the job was making video games. I got really excited. Then I got the idea that I was going to earn as much money as I could, so by the end of summer I would have the money to buy whatever equipment I needed for my senior thesis. But by the end of summer, I didn’t care about photography anymore. I was completely into game development. Thankfully the lessons I learned from photography were applicable to game design in some ways. I had trained my eye to see, if you will. I decided to stay with the company and build games. 

Very nice.

The first game I worked on was called Mad Dog McCree. It was a western where the player had to only shoot the people in the black hats, not any bystanders, or people wearing white hats. I sat there watching each frame of the video and drew boxes around the people, indicating whether or not this was a person who should be shot. Throughout that time, I started asking questions like, ‘couldn’t we write a script for this to happen?’ ‘Could we make these tools easier to use?’ For the first couple of years I was a technical artist, asking a lot of the questions about improving the process of making the game. I liked the idea of rapid iteration of the content we were creating. Then I started asking questions like, ‘what should the player be doing?’ and ‘how does the player know what to do?’ and I found myself becoming a designer pretty quickly.

Cool. What do you like about Schell Games?

I’ve spent over twenty years on the west coast in the AAA console, shooter, sometimes adventure world. I think of it as a very heady time. We were working with big budgets, working on $20 million dollar games with a $20 million dollar marketing budget, and it was very exciting. The trade-off was that we were actually a lot more creatively-constrained.

How so?

There are a couple of reasons. With that kind of budget, it is important to ameliorate risk as much as possible. The number one way of ameliorating risk is to make sure that the game is something that people will like and buy. That means it is really hard to innovate. There are times that the AAAs would take one #1 hit, and try to mash it up with another #1 hit, in order to create something new. Other times, we had conversations ending with “we can’t do that because we don’t know if people will like it.” And that may sound surprising to some in the industry because they think the AAAs are pushing the envelope, but really that part of the industry is polishing what is already known to work.

So what I like about Schell Games is that we have enormous creative freedom. Not just with our internal IP, but the type of clients we attract are looking for a studio that is not afraid to innovate, to look at things with a different lens, or try new technology to see what it can do.That is super valuable to me. 

Also we put a high value on the quality of life of our people. Our people are our value. If they are grinding themselves into dust, we know that it doesn’t help them stay, do their best work, or cooperate in a team to solve the hard problems of innovation and new technologies. We spend a lot of time and energy making sure that their quality of life is good. I like that very much.

I also love the emphasis on continuous improvement we have in the studio. We take continuous looks at our processes, the way we do projects- just everything- and try to figure out ways to improve them. There is much less of the “that’s just the way we do it here” culture. That sense of looking to optimize everything is what drew me into the industry, whether it’s creativity, technology or whatever issue we’re trying to tackle.

Where do you see the video games industry in five years?

What the hardware manufacturers want to do is to find the ‘killer app’ for VR/AR/MR. Somebody is going to figure out a way for a player to stay in VR to a point that it feels totally worth the value of the hardware. Once that happens, everything will flow from there. From playing a lot of games and watching the industry, seeing how our teams are solving these problems, I am starting to see glimmers of that. I’m trying to figure it out myself.

It will change everything in the way free-to-play games changed mobile gaming. The industry is still trying to figure out what kind of VR experience consumers will want to spend money- and time- on.

True.

If you go on Reddit, you’ll see that people think that the VR industry right now is just a sea of demos. We know that isn’t really the case, but that’s what people think. VR content is super expensive to make, and publishers have to be convinced to throw money behind it. The “gadget” industry is getting saturated, so the VR/AR space is really exciting, because it is new and different.

What’s unique about being on a leadership team in a game studio?

Never in my career thus far, have I had more opportunity to affect how much risk we take on. There’s a fine line when it comes to risk. I believe that in order to be creative and innovative, there is some risk involved. But taking on too much risk has its own issues. In the place we’re at, we can have good conversations about the opportunities in front of us, and the risks associated. It’s something that we think about a lot.

The kind of relationships that you get to make with the amazing developers we have here, and some of the clients we have here, is really unique for me. Getting a chance to work with people from companies that I deeply admire and asking them about creative projects that they’d like to see happen is awesome and satisfying for me.

As vice president of design for Schell Games, you get very busy. How do you stay on top of your craft and discipline?

I try to do it in several ways. In the studio, I play every single game we’ve made on a regular cadence. I play the game with the project teams, and we discuss exactly what it is they are trying to do. In a lot of cases, I am an early playtester for the teams to see if they are succeeding or not in what they’re trying to do. I tell them what experiences I liked in the game, and what I thought was challenging. I try to use those opportunities to connect teams who have solved similar problems or challenges, and to make sure that whatever insight they need is what we talk about.

In terms of staying on top of ‘game design’ as a craft, the main thing is to try to play a variety of different games frequently. It isn’t possible anymore with the size of the industry and number of releases to play every big game that comes out. Right now, since we as a studio have been focusing on VR, I’ve been focusing on playing VR games. I write up a “5 minute critique” of each game I play as a way to keep my thoughts organized. I write down my overall thoughts about the game, how it addressed certain design aspects (i.e. in VR, embodiment and presence) and what we, as a design team, can learn from that experience.

How does that process translate to your leadership of the design team?

I get the chance to have conversations about what the team is interested in making, what games are out there that they think are interesting, and what ground-breaking concept they think we can tackle. Playing all these games and having these conversations gives me more context on what I’d like to explore.

With Schell Games having such a large design team, there must be quite a spectrum of what individual team members like or think is interesting.

Absolutely. We do say that ‘diversity makes us strong’ when it comes to hiring, to the clients we work with, and to the type of work we do, and it is also true when it comes to the interests that our teams have. When I’m looking at a potential new team member, I try to see if this person is bringing a new perspective, background, or skill, different from our other designers.

What advice would you give to a person trying to get into the game industry?

I think Schell Games is a little different than other full-service game studios because we prioritize the ability to collaborate and work well with others. Flexibility is also a huge factor. We do so many different projects that it is necessary for you to be flexible. We also like it if you have multiple areas of expertise, so you can serve your teams in multiple ways if the project demands it. But that’s particular to Schell Games. For design, having expertise in different backgrounds or coming from a different industry puts you in a position to inform. It places you at an advantage.

(For more about the hiring characteristics for Schell Games, read the interview with general counsel Chris Arnold.)

For the games industry in general, for many years we have said that it is important for you to make games and to show that you have made games. So we encouraged people to go to game jams, and learn game engines, and things like that. And it is still important. But I do not think it is the single point of breaking into the industry anymore. I think games are an increasingly sophisticated medium. As the games industry matures, we need people who can evaluate content and the experiences provided in the medium, and speak clearly and succinctly about what they can improve, and how they would do that. Developing a standard or a habit for critique is very valuable. Games are not created in a vacuum- games have budgets, timelines, teams- so having a strategy or process is important.

Interesting.

Also, learn to code. An understanding of what computers are good at and what they are not will make working with you much more attractive.  

Where do you see Schell Games in five years?

I think we will have shifted more of our work to our internal IP (original games). By then, we will have launched a very successful game, and I think that we will be working on the second phase of it, whatever that may look like. We will have grown, not extensively, but bigger than we are now. I do see us being a major player and influencer at the intersection of VR and learning, along with new technology.

(Internal IP: I Expect You To Die, Happy Atoms, and SuperChem VR)

What is one thing about leadership that you have learned on the job?

The hardest and most important one was learning to trust my team. When I was first promoted to a design lead, I was leading ten designers. I was conducting a brainstorm session, but trying to control the brainstorm to lead them to conclusions that I thought we should make. I was afraid that the team wouldn’t get to the right answers unless I led them. During one of the days of the brainstorm, I got so sick - to the point that I shouldn’t have gone to work - and I asked someone else to lead the brainstorm. I sat in the back room and watched my team. For the first 45 minutes, I was terrified. But they ended up designing something really cool, and came up with really good questions to continue answering. I knew and trusted them as good designers, but I had to learn to put my money where my mouth was, and trust them more with some of the high-level design questions. I needed to have them steer me, not me steering them. When I follow that lesson, I see my teams create and represent ideas and concepts on a much bigger scale than what I can do on my own. The best ideas come from teams that were given the opportunity and responsibility to build them from the start.

What’s your favorite video game?

Oh, how funny you ask. When I’m interviewing a candidate, and after I ask all the hard and scary questions and the candidate is about to walk out the door, I ask them what they think the best game of all time is.

Really?

Yes! And you would not believe how many people choke on that question. They think there is a right or wrong answer, or that the game they think is the best will be deemed a bad game by other people. When I ask that question, I’m not looking for a particular game, I want to see how the candidate reasons why they think it’s the best game of all time. Is there an emotional connection? Did the game make you feel smart? What did the experience do for you that made it the best game?

For me right now, my favorite game is Portal 2, specifically with the co-op mode. I love how important communication is in the game, and how smart the game is. Before Portal 2 I liked Portal, and before that I really enjoyed Quake II.

What in your opinion, makes the leadership team at Schell Games click?

We work together often, and we trust each other to do what we all do well. It is something that Jesse [Schell] has consciously built into the team and the studio. He is always looking for ways for us to communicate better; whether it is among us, or across disciplines, or studio-wide. He actively encourages us to communicate forthrightly and sensitively. There’s really no politics in the leadership team. We try to be accountable to one another.

Given unlimited resources, no timeline, and an unlimited budget, what type of experience would you like to see Schell Games create?

Two things I’ve always had a soft spot for are imaginary worlds and emergent systems. With those kinds of resources, I’d want to make a fantastical imaginary VR world - - like those gorgeous science fiction / fantasy book covers -- with lots of emergent systems -- and of course, complex social interactions as well. Imagine if the kinds of emergent systems that illuminate Skyrim and Breath of the Wild worked in social interactions with real players. And or course, I also would want to slay - or ride - or breed - dragons.

Like what?

First, I tried to be a writer. And when you’re 22 years old, you really don’t have that much to write about. I discovered I was not going to be the next Hemingway or Vonnegut, so I began searching for my next venture. I moved from Beaver Falls to Pittsburgh, and I got a job as a personal assistant to the CEO and CFO of Mellon Financial.

I worked for Martin McGuinn and Steven Elliott, pillars of the Pittsburgh community. I was hired to get them coffee, make sure their reports were printed on the right paper, and other administrative tasks.

Okay, then what?

Well, one thing I always try to do, and did back then, is to keep my eyes open and learn things. In doing that job, I gained a pretty unique perspective on how corporations operate. It really changed my thinking. How opportunities could be created- or in the case of the bank- how the bank gave companies the opportunity to create, was fascinating. It was a powerful experience for me. I developed a relationship with their general counsel, a former partner of ReedSmith and we talked a lot. Part of my job was to record the minutes and notes from Board of Directors meetings, so I had a chance to read them. I became very interested. I asked the counsel questions and he, thankfully, liked when people asked questions so he answered me. He encouraged me to apply to law school. I had never considered the law as a career before. I applied to law school and was accepted. I always wanted to help people in some way- back to the idea of becoming a doctor- and I was beginning to think that law could be a different way to do it.

What aspect(s) of law interested you?

While I was taking classes, the idea of intellectual property was really fascinating. I discovered that my talent is suited to defending and helping individuals with creative ability to relate to the larger world.

Okay, interesting.

Learning on how to protect ideas and creativity, and to use them to create wealth were topics of interest to me. From there, I got a job at law firm Fox Rothschild in Pittsburgh. I wasn’t doing intellectual property law at that time, but I learned really great lessons on how to be an attorney and how to treat clients well. I learned from incredible professionals, who took time to train me, to answer my questions, and to make sure I was a fundamentally sound, good advocate for my clients. While there, I was representing doctors and physicians, and helping to create companies.

Later, one of my former professors at Pitt asked if I wanted to join his law firm, Buchanan Ingersoll, one of the bigger law firms in the city of Pittsburgh, to work in their tech transactions group. That’s when I got started in intellectual property as the centerpiece of value in different company transactions. After that experience, I decided that intellectual property law was something I wanted to do. Later I worked on the client-side in intellectual property, and that’s where I first met Jake Witherell [COO of Schell Games].

What did you do next?

Working as the general counsel for that company, I started exploring ways to best leverage intellectual property. And somehow, I inherited the responsibilities of human resources (HR). I had no idea about working in HR. But it became clear to me very quickly that regardless what business you’re in, you’re in the people business. You need to respect how privileged you are to have contact with people who need your help and that you have the opportunity to help them. I like learning, so I started reading about best practices and policies that made sense. One of the things I’ve always been mindful of is to never let the goals of a HR department get swallowed by procedure, and I think that it can happen very easily. From there, I went to Mylan, a pharmaceuticals company, and spent my time exclusively on intellectual property.

While at Mylan, Jake, with whom I’d worked for only a short period of time, contacted me and asked if I wanted to join him at his current employer. I knew from meeting Jake that he was someone I wanted to work with; he’s brilliant, humble, and by far the most genuine person I have ever met.

Very Cool.

I was like, “Let’s do this.” I came to Schell Games and I met Jesse for the first time. I had no idea who he was, what this industry was, or anything. I was cautiously curious about this opportunity, but Jake assured me that I should look into the studio and Jesse himself. 

How did you get started looking into Schell Games?

I went on YouTube and researched Jesse. I listened to his concepts, and learned what he believed. I was impressed with his message and the fact that he was taking big swings on big issues. When I met Jesse, I found out that not only is he brilliant but he’s one of the more generous, caring individuals I’ve ever met. Since that time, it has been my personal and professional privilege to represent him and the studio. It’s been a joy heading up HR, trying to create a culture and environment where people can be their best selves; where people can grow and work on amazing things with amazing people.

(The principles and mission statement for Schell Games)

When people apply to work at Schell Games, they often want to know what the benefits are. Sometimes it means health care plans, vacation plans, and those things are important. But in the grand scheme of things, those things are insignificant compared to an organization’s commitment everyday to make the big and small decisions with the best interest of the employees. What I mean by that is: 1) do not over regulate things, 2) understand what is important to people and makes them happy, and 3) try to deliver as consistently as possible. Running a business is messy, and full of compromise. But one thing Jesse has never compromised is his commitment to making this place amazing and sustainable for the people here. That takes courage and personal sacrifice. It’s been a lot of fun to be a part of it. 

Since you oversee legal and HR, there’s a lot on your plate. How do you stay on the top of your disciplines?

First, you need to have some humility. You will not stay on top of everything. You need to establish a network, and it can be a mix of internal and external people and resources. For me, I take one piece at a time. For the legal aspect, I need to be the point person for contractual relationships, employment relations- the things that govern all the people in the studio- all the time. When issues arise that require a nuanced approach to the current state of the law, I make sure I build relationships with those experts in those relative fields.

Do you have an example of that?

Sure. For instance, 2016 and 2017 have been extraordinarily turbulent times for our foreign national employees. There have been many real and rumored changes to the current immigration system. Making sure that our employees not only get information- but expert information- in a timely manner is very important. We have established a network which enables me to deliver that information in a way that is actionable to them, so they can continue planning their lives.

(See Chris and other legal experts in Pittsburgh respond to the February 2017 announcement about the ‘travel ban’)

In other aspects, there are projects like Happy Atoms. We applied for a U.S. patent for the modeling set. I am an intellectual property attorney, but not a patent attorney. In order to obtain the protection and go through the application process, we retained other attorneys. Also, in my group of friends we talk, and I get information from them to make sure that I am properly fulfilling my responsibilities in the best way possible.

(Happy Atoms, a physical and digital chemistry modeling set)

Okay, good deal. Now what about the HR side?

For HR, I am incredibly lucky to have Lauren Reed, our HR manager. Lauren is a ravenous consumer of information. She is very connected on all national trends relating to our industry and to companies in general. It is important to make sure that you are following best practices for your employees. We are actually exceeding a number of those ‘best practices,’ The way we look at it, the ‘best practice’ is our floor. Anything else, anything that might be more flexible, or more difficult to administer, we’re on it. We’re in the solving business. We’re not in the business to make HR easy. It takes work. It doesn’t matter if it’s hard for us;  we want to make sure the policies and practices we adopt work for the people who work here. The trap that many HR departments fall into is trying to avoid the hard stuff. It’s easy to do that. They may think “how can we make this process more efficient?” but efficient and effective are different words for very good reasons. They don’t always mean the same thing.

(HR Manager Lauren Reed speaking to a group about attracting and retaining a diverse workforce)

That’s very true.

We aim to be effective. It’s a balancing act, but we try to do right by our people with the resources we have. When we do something, you have to understand that people may not see the whole picture. It doesn’t change people’s expectations. And you have to make peace with that reality. If you don’t, you’re going to be miserable. You can’t have the mindset “I can’t believe all these people want me to do all this..”, because yes, they do. Of course they do! Should they really understand that we’re a small company, not a FORTUNE 500, and we can’t do a lot of things those companies can do all at once, without the benefit of that kind of capital? No, but we do the best we can, and we make sure that when we do something that it’s consistent with the type of place Jesse wants to create. Whenever there is a new or changed policy, it’s not disconnected. It makes our teams better. It makes our place more fun and playful. It hopefully creates an environment where people feel free to grow. I think those are the things that we look for when we try to manage all the expectations of our people and the duties and responsibilities we have.

From a hiring perspective, what characteristics do you look for in a potential hire that other companies or other industries might overlook or ignore?

The thing that separates our industry from other custom software companies- especially those that I have worked with- is our lack of ego. If you’re going to work at Schell Games, you have to check your ego at the door. I like the way that Jesse puts it, “this is not the place for talented jerks.” You cannot be a diva, and you cannot think your ideas are precious, because the only thing that matters is the experience the team is building. It’s important because our scale for success is different. 

How do you think it is different?

For traditional software companies, or custom software developers, those companies are creating products that solve problems the user has. Look at TurboTax, for example. It has to make sure that the user’s tax return is right, while also delivering an easy customer experience. So for TurboTax, getting a 10 out of 10 for customer satisfaction is important. But our scale is a 15 out of 10. We have to do everything that TurboTax et. al. do, but we also have to garner the “holy crap this stuff is magic” response. We have to create experiences that people would rather do instead of watch TV, listen to music, or other leisure activities you can imagine. We are battling for the discretionary time of the consumer when they come across any of our products. Discretionary time is the most precious resource in the world. No government is going to require you to play a video game, or go to an amusement park.

(Screenshot of the awesome art in mobile VR game Frostbound, a Schell Games original game)

I see what you mean. How does Schell Games create that type of experience?

For us to get to that ‘15 out of 10,’ our products require an inordinate amount of iteration. Trying different things, playtesting again and again, and at every step there are ideas that have to change. There will be ideas that you as a developer thought were brilliant, but end up being flaming disasters. Not only do you have to be okay with that, but you have to want to know that your idea or design might not work. To do that, you have to be humble, and be willing to seek out information in a way that is typically pretty foreign to people not in this industry. When people come to interview here, I tell them that being able to collaborate with passion and humility is crucial. Our process of rapid iteration demands that people communicate clearly and give their best selves at all times.

To put it simply, the people who do the best in our studio are those who can give good feedback and work well with others, while being incredibly technologically savvy.

What makes the Schell Games leadership team click?

Everyone has the same goals. No one is working off some different agenda. Everyone wants to make great, meaningful games and experiences together. When weighing the opportunity of a new project or policy, the leadership always thinks about all the factors that could affect the studio. While there may be differences in opinion, there are never differences in the over-arching goal.

What advice would you give to those trying to get into the video game industry?