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EGD 030: Learning From Successful Teams With Will Luton

Will Luton runs a management consultant company called Department of Play, which focuses on the games industry. Will has been in the industry for over a decade and is an active spokesperson on making things better in gaming.

In this episode, we discuss with Will about successful teams and go into detail on his article on Games Industry biz, titled ”What we can learn from successful game teams”.

The article is available here: https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2019-10-14-what-we-can-learn-from-successful-game-teams

Topics that we discuss include:

  • Do you work with a lot of teams on culture?
  • Can you talk about the Game Outcomes project that you mention in the article, and how did you discover this research?
  • Crunch doesn’t work, but what about startups who are working on a title, and the last two months things get crazy because money is running out?
  • Financial incentives don’t matter for a game’s success. This is probably hard to understand for people who’ve just joined the industry?
  • Autonomy, Mastery, and Purpose. Have you seen great examples of game companies and teams for coming up with a meaningful purpose?
  • Psychological safety. Staff feels safe to bring out concerns. When safely voiced out, who is responsible for the reaction on the concerns?
  • What doesn’t matter is how teams communicate. Production methods don’t matter, as long as it’s managed somehow. You mention remote work in the article as something that could change things in the future?