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 Features
GDC
2002: Moving to Multiple Projects
First
Steps
Evaluate
the Company Culture
What
are your company's values and culture? Is it a smaller boutique studio
that specializes in making a single type of game, or is it already a more
formal corporate environment with a firm grounding in the business of
making games? It's advisable to try and match your growth goals with your
existing company structure as it will make growth easier. It's possible
to change company culture, but it has to be done actively over a considerable
amount of time.
Evaluate
Management Structure
Do you have the managers necessary to run multiple projects, e.g.
if you want to run two projects do you have two producers? Also recognize
that new management challenges arise once you are no longer the one resolving
interpersonal issues - can you trust the people you have in place to take
care of all personnel problems? Is there a clear reporting structure for
managers? How do you add new mangers? Do you hire them or promote internally?
Are you sure your new managers share your view of management?
Evaluate
Communications
How
many of your current communication techniques are effective in an organization
where you'll talk meaningfully to the majority of people less than once
a week? How are you going to disseminate information to the whole company?
Who are your internal advisors?
Evaluate
Operational Structure
Before
growing you need to consider some of the more mundane elements required
in running a business, such resources as: office space, copies of software,
number of computers, IT staff, and general admin staff. Consider that
requirements for some of these resources don't increase linearly as you
grow, but instead exceed your expectations, growing practically exponentially.
We've certainly found this to be the case with IT staff as we've grown
- we hit critical mass and went from one to five full time network/systems
administrators (plus two full time webmasters) as our network expanded
and as we got more aggressive on the Internet.
Evaluate Company Resources
A
growing company needs to consider core resources such as HR completely
differently than it did when it was small. A larger company can no longer
evaluate issues on a case by case basis and instead needs some general
policies that can be applied to a variety of situations. These often relate
back to company values - this helps keep them grounded. A larger studio
can't avoid some 'red tape' - the key is keeping at as minimal as possible.
Our approach has been to establish core company values. We have only two
core values: quality in our products, and quality in our workplace, that
can be applied to all situations. Our policies are a direct offshoot of
our company values.
Evaluate
the Preferences of the People at the Company
As
archaic and simple as it sounds, this is probably the most important point
to consider. You need to have a shared vision of your ultimate target
company, and this vision must be shared with the people who are at the
company. If they don't agree with the direction the company is going they
will simply leave. Carefully consider this when growing your studio as
it may literally end up completely different from when you started the
process.
Different Structures
of the Growing Studio
Team
Based Approach
This
method involves no overlap between projects - each team is sacrosanct
and shares neither personnel nor technology. This does work, but there
is little intra-company spirit, and you're more likely to have competition
between the teams that can sometimes get ugly. Works well for a 1 or two
team company. We consciously decided to avoid this structure as we grew.
Departmental
Approach
This
method involves overlapping most development duties and assigning them
to specialized groups that takes care of their one task. The challenge
here is a lack of team spirit; people might have faith in the company,
but they likely have little attachment to any particular project.
The Matrix
(Bioware
structure) This method is effectively a hybrid of the team and departmental
approaches, drawing upon the strengths and the weakness of both. Everyone
is both on the team and in a department, but they sometimes have competing
goals from the team and department, and hence they need strong leadership
(and corporate values/goals) and extremely clear communication to be effective.
When the Matrix works it is very powerful, but when broken it is very
destructive. The matrix is based inherently on conflict between teams
and between the teams and departments hence the matrix leads need to be
strong-willed as do the project leaders and departmental leaders. Yet
everyone needs to have the overall goals of the company at heart, first
and foremost at all times (this should complement and supercede the specific
project or departmental goals). This structure works well for a mid-sized
developer of 3-6 projects if the communications infrastructure is well-thought
out and if appropriate senior (producers, department directors) and mid-level
managers (leads on the projects) are available.
Less-
or Unstructured Approach
Another possible structure is a much less structured company: multidisciplinary
teams form and dissolve on the basis of the needs of subprojects. In this
format there is much less management and structure than above approaches.
A few developers use this approach with variable degrees of success -
the success of the team and project is more directly related to the personal
qualities of the team members rather than any particular manager or visionary,
though a strong company leader is likely a critical element in this approach
succeeding.
Assesing the Impact
of Growth
Positive
In
addition to business awards and other accolades that indirectly generate
increased revenue (via increased company profile leading to improved quality
of job applicants, increased availability of financing and better contracts),
growth is positive as it can lead to:
Duplication
of valuable skill-sets within a company - one of the challenges facing
any company is turnover of staff. With a larger company there should be
some duplication of skills that can reduce the impact of the loss of key
staff. Of course, there is also increased demand in a larger company.
In general with more people at the company there is also an opportunity
to apply more people to certain problems for limited periods of time -
there is an advantage of flexibility of staffing.
More development
bandwidth to try a variety of design ideas - with more people and projects
you can try out more ideas. This is of course of benefit in that the more
projects you release the larger chance you have for a success.
Increase
in the value of the shareholders' equity - as owners of the company this
will ultimately translate into better sales prices should the owners decide
to sell. It will also allow greater debt capacity (you can borrow more
if your equity is worth more - since banks look at things like debt to
equity ratios).
Improved
compensation and opportunities - growth also provides opportunity to reward
staff with increased compensation and provides an outlet for staff to
grow within the company (instead of leaving it). In short, growth allows
for more opportunities for people with more experience and has the potential
to keep them stimulated in what they are doing longer.
Negative
Growth
can be destructive when it leads to:
Less
personal accountability for success of all of the company's projects.
In a large faceless company it's hard to get excited about every release.
There is a careful balance that must be managed to be large enough to
do a lot, but not large enough that people don't care.
Fragmented communication. Probably the first thing you'll notice
in a larger company is that communication is much harder than when the
company was smaller. At Bioware we've worked very hard to maintain strong
communication as the glue that holds the company together.
A lack
of focus for both the company and individuals. As a company grows
there often is a loss of focus as competing forces within the company
pull it in multiple directions. When it gets too large to be controlled
by the existing management it will quickly spin out of control.
More
complicated business and personal interactions. In the early days
of Bioware life seemed much easier and simpler. Perhaps it was, or perhaps
we were just naïve. Whichever it is, we can never return to the free
and easy approach of our first few years.
Running
out of money and bankruptcy. The big scary result that is perhaps
the most common result of growth. Once the company hits all the above
bad points this one usually isn't far off. It unfortunately happens more
often than we all realize!
How do you Reconcile
Competition for Resources?
Balancing
projects within a growing company is challenging and fundamentally different
from the issues faced by a one-project company. Not all projects have
equal potential so senior studio personnel have to sometimes make hard
decisions to decide who gets most of the pie. Some ideas on how set priorities
include: priority based on release date, priority based on potential,
priority based on project momentum, and most importantly the potential
for profit (return on investment, net present value, etc.) from a given
project. It's most wise to put your money into the sure bet with the greatest
and quickest chance of profitability.
Communication Rechniques
for the Growing Company
Open
Communication
One
way to communicate is to tell everyone everything all the time. This gets
hard if you have bad news to share. Open book policy means that people
have expectation of getting more information all of the time - if you
stop providing this at some point rumors will run rampant (e.g. in terms
of financials people will wonder whether the financials have deteriorated).
So, once you go down this path it's very hard to turn back.
Structured
Communication
Another
way to communicate is to carefully structure communications either in
company meetings, personnel meetings or company bulletins and memos. This
makes it easier to share information but can lose that personal touch.
This usually involves the partial sharing of financial information, and
open discussion of company direction at frequent team and department meetings,
and full company meetings. This is the approach we take at Bioware.
Rumor-dispelling
Zeschuk's
law: The number of rumors generated at a company per week is directly
related to the size of the company! In a growing company people often
don't know whom to believe when it comes to what sounds like important
company business. It's important to understand that rumors are a sign
of a lack of communication and they should dissipate once communications
improve.
No or
Poor Communication
This
is bad - avoid it! (If you're wondering why, that's proof right there
that no communication is something to avoid. Effective communication can
be a lot of work sometimes but in the end [in our experience] it will
save reams of time and is well worth the up-front cost in terms of time).
How Can You Tell
When You've Grown Too Fast?
Some simple
metrics to gauge when you're grown too fast: you don't remember the names
of people in the company (of course, this can also be due to the porous
memory of a manager), people aren't sure who their 'boss' is (this can
also be due to poor communication of what the company org chart looks
like), failure of scheduling for no apparent reason, poor integration
of new personnel into existing projects or departments, and deterioration
of the company financials.
Other metrics
to consider include looking at financials more closely - some common ratios
to consider such as:
ROA, ROE,
ROI, debt ratios, inventory turnover, days inventory, measures of cash
flow, measures of profitability, etc., may be useful to look at (and having
a good internal financial system and controls will allow for these ratios
to be understood and evaluated).
Another
area to consider is role definitions: are people overloaded due to increasing
demands on their time in a rapidly growing company? One way to tell this
is for staff to write down everything that they are doing in a day - this
allows you to identify specific roles that are being filled on a project
and in a company, and consider ways to hire more people to delegate to
should people get overloaded.
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