Pyramid of Game Company Culture

I've often thought about how to envision the ideal game company culture. The pyramid seemed a great way to think about it: you have a foundation, then things are threaded onto it that ultimately reach the apex, which is successful games.

Here's how I want to explain all four layers, starting from the base—people.

People

It's all about people and their behavior, how they relate to others, and that a group consists of different individuals.

Safety, which supports a sense of psychological safety, creates a feeling of calm for everything that happens at work. "You are safe" is what children feel when they are near their parents. Leaders should treat their employees with a similar sense of safety.

Belonging—statements like "You belong here." Every new employee is a new node in the network of people at the company. This becomes more challenging as more people join, but people feel their belonging through shared rituals of gratitude.

By serving, you leave your ego at the door and work for the good of the company. You serve the cause, the beliefs that everyone shares.

Diversity—you need people of different cultures, genders, and ages. If you exclude people from your group, consciously or unconsciously, you push them away from your company, and worse, from the diverse thoughts that could lead to unique ideas.

Learning

Learning is understanding how you and your team become better at your work every day.

We try new things, setting aside time for experimentation. As I wrote in EGD News 44, making decisions at the concept or prototype stage is like flipping a coin. But we shouldn't focus on that if we want to withstand the hit-driven nature of the game business. The focus should be on the systems the developer relies on, how these systems reveal the essence, how they support our discussions, and how they drive us to take quick actions and experiments.

Build, repeating the mantra every day that we need to build, and then we will know and have results. Many game ideas are great on paper but not so great when assembled into a prototype. Some game projects can last months before seeing the light on an actual device. Smart developers quickly move to public game development, releasing alpha or beta versions of games and iterating on them. By constantly building the game, you create more learning opportunities and increase your chances of success.

Speaking and Listening

Communication is entirely linked to learning.

When we communicate, most learning happens through listening. You have an opinion, but try to consider it correct only for the moment. You might be missing something, and new facts can emerge through conversation with others.

There are limitations and barriers: communicating over Zoom is worse than face-to-face, words are often not specific enough. Cultural: individual history, context, conditioning. The battle between logic and emotion drives thinking.

Listeners are respected when they show interest in understanding another's position. They don't seek to show how smart they are.

Creativity

Creativity is coming up with ideas. Ideas are born in the mind when we assemble them.

To generate these ideas, you combine old things. For these combinations to work, a game developer needs to see the relationship between these old things. What makes creativity unique to individuals is that games consist of millions of old things and millions of new things that have not yet been brought into the game through those relationships.

A diverse group of people gathered around a table makes it possible to assemble and bring to life unseen relationships between old and new things.

Data

To confirm your opinion, understand if something is right or not, and make a decision, game developers need data.

Data has gotten a bad reputation in game development, mainly because creativity lost its role in the decision-making process. Often data cannot be interpreted with full clarity without understanding the creative ideas behind the hypothesis.

The beauty of data in games is that the game is played by thousands of players. Through the statistical accuracy of their actions, we can precisely determine new outcomes. We can compare how much our work has improved the game and how quickly we can move to the next item on the list.

Execution

The quality of execution depends on having the right people and the right learning systems. Execution is when the engine is running and all its parts are functioning perfectly.

Rapid Advancement

Once you have the behaviors and learning systems, what speed can you achieve? Another way is to ask how much you can achieve in a given time. And once the first game is released, will your team still be alive and ready to create the next game?

Optimal Decision-making

Decision-making becomes more precise when you have all the foundational basics. When you have great systems, you learn not to fall into traps that lead to poor outcomes.

You understand that the worst decisions are made when you seek information that seems important but actually isn't. You understand that setting goals is good, but arbitrary goals will lead nowhere. On the contrary, working on a slow upward path is healthier for the culture.

Rely on the best systems, and the best decisions will become the norm in your company.

Games

Great games don't come from hero designers who have a great game. They aren't created by looking at the top-grossing charts and mixing a few games from the list.

People, learning systems, and execution will lead to great games.