Thursday, June 28, 2018

GDC 2018 - Art Leadership Roundtable - Day 3


On the third (and final) day of the Art Leadership Roundtable, I was inspired to throw a particularly difficult question to the attendees.  How did the role of Art Director differ from your expectations before you found yourself in that role?

Naturally, the follow-up questions would be to explore what was learned as well as the surprises that were encountered.  Ultimately, my goal was to demystify the role itself while at the same time shedding light on potential surprises in leadership.

Candidly, I think the audience was a little surprised by the topic and a bit hesitant to share at first.  Nevertheless, we were able to dive into the topic by first talking about failures (either personal or observed).

The first attendee to share their experiences talked about failing to notify the creative director of the project as they were making decisions/changes.  Naturally, this resulted in some lost trust between the two individuals.  The team had been developing a "vertical slice" prototype of the game.  However, due to lack of communication, the prototype was declared a "miss" as the objectives had not been properly aligned.  The attendee shared that, in hindsight, they should have been communicating their intent and providing context behind the decisions that were being made.  Through time, trust was reestablished through improved and more consistent dialog.

Another participant shared their experience in going from being a solo artist to heading up a team of artists.  Their expectation, going into the role, was that they would automatically be the center of communication.  The reality was that they were not.  In response, this person spent time identifying who were truly the "nexus points" of communication of the project and building relationships in those areas.  They also identified that tech art was a useful source in the communication pipeline as they are a natural bridge between disciplines.

After that, another attendee pointed out one of their own surprises in the Art Director role.  Until that point, they had not realized how much effort would be spent on "presenting upwards."  In short, they were not prepared for having to present their ideas to Execs and CEOs.  Performing this kind of work effectively requires learning to sell a vision.  On their path to improvement, this attendee sought mentorship from other directors within the studio.

One topic that also generated a good chuckle from the roundtable was the realization of how much time was spent in meetings or engaging in project management activities.  This wasn't intended as a direct criticism of meetings, but rather that how many meetings were necessary to attend in order to maintain awareness of all of the moving parts of a project.  While we did touch briefly on delegation on how others leaders can help, the revelation was focused on how much the art director was required to project context behind the decisions the art team was making.  In addition, the person expressing these revelations recognized that they had to communicate as much outward as they did to the individual artists.  Ultimately, they recognized that their role is about avoiding situations where individuals are required to "fill in the blanks" or come to their own conclusions without context or prerequisite knowledge.  This communication was also integral in maintaining visibility.

Another attendee wanted to share a specific experience as it relates to relinquishing content creation.  Most individuals realize as they move into leadership roles that they have to sacrifice the time that previously would have been devoted to content creation.  This attendee wanted to share the revelation that you need to relinquish a lot more than just content.  Rather, this person suggested that you focus primarily on the things that you must do or the things that only you can do -- and then develop a strategy for delegating the rest.  The general consensus from the attendees was that delegation is a constant act of balancing priorities combined with the realization/acceptance that some things are just going to "fall off the list."

Related to the previous topic, another attendee expressed their own surprise by how much "chaos" there is in project leadership, and how much the art director is expected to react to various changes within the pace of development.  This individual expressed that a large volume (~75%) of their day was spent coordinating and communicating with the creative director and other team leaders.  In response to so many questions coming their way, this person reasonably assumed that all of these things was their responsibility.  In hindsight, they recognized that they should have been delegating more to seniors and leads.  This is a common thread across many years of the leadership roundtable -- the recognition of the sheer volume of "other things" that must be addressed which no one perceives prior to finding themselves in the role.

Another attendee pointed out that their biggest surprise was recognizing how much the role of the AD can impact the individual holding that position.  The individual in that role possesses a large amount of responsibility.  As such, they are often at the center of critical decisions and are often assailed by a "bombardment of complexity" where one decision can have impact in multiple areas.  As a result, the person in this role often faces decision fatigue.  Furthermore, the role often struggles with the work/life balance as many responsibilities have to be tackled outside of office hours, especially when meetings become too frequent.  A number of common solutions were voiced, including allowing oneself time to solve problems rather than always trying to resolve issues immediately.  Also, if you are giving yourself more time, you also work harder to project reasonable deadlines for yourself.  In addition, it was suggested that the AD partner with an Art Manager to allow themselves to focus on content, while their partner focuses on the team.

As the topic of the Art Manager had just arisen, we pivoted slightly to discuss this role in more detail.  The original question was about whom the Art Manager should report to.  One attendee worked in a studio where the Art Manager reported to the Art Director.  They shared an office, and the Art Manager (despite being a direct report) was given an equal voice.  In this scenario, the Art Manager can clearly be delegated greater responsibility and (to an extent) more authority.  In contrast, another attendee had experience with Art Managers who reported to Production.  In that scenario, the Art Manager is more responsible for the schedule and the team, rather than the content directly.  Also, in that role, the Art Manager is more able to respond to problems the Art Director might be creating (and can solicit feedback from the bottom-up).  In short, individuals may feel more comfortable expressing concerns to Art Manager if they don't report to the same Director.  Regardless of how the reporting structure is established, the general consensus was that the Art Manager should work in partnership with an Art Director who knows their own strengths and weaknesses and builds a relationship that caters to their own abilities.

At this point, an attendee voiced one of my favorite topics of the roundtable:  how to deal with fear (especially for those new to the art director role).  I love this question.  At this risk of putting words into someone else's mouth, I feel like I need to provide a little context here.  We don't talk about "fear" enough in this industry.  All of the comments about the AD role (responsibility, chaos, work/life balance, pressure, impostor syndrome, etc.) can be contribute to a fear response.  Unfortunately, fear can undermine both problem solving and creativity -- there's actually a lot of social science that backs up this.  If you're interested in learning more, I suggest David Rock's SCARF Model.

The attendees offered a number of suggestions from personal experience.  One person suggested investing more time in introspection -- carving out part of your day for reflection and consideration.  The intention here is to train the brain to think before acting.  Others suggested that the strength to manage the fear comes with experience.  Lean into the experience rather than recoiling.  One could imagine this as developing resistance to fear through exposure to the triggers.  However, there is still the adage of knowing oneself and knowing when you are ready.  One attendee strongly advised that "acceptance" is a crucial component; one should accept that they are learning and that they can and will make mistakes.  Naturally, one should also hope that there is a support structure in place to enable learning and development.

Lastly, one person added a comment on how, as the art director, to adapt to the fear of the team.  One should be prepared and be confident in their plans.  One should learn to minimize their negative language, and learn to communicate in (reasonably) positive tones.  Another attendee strongly advised that, when dealing with team fear, not to project invulnerability.  If you set an expectation of infallibility, it will be that much harder for the team to accept changes when mistakes do happen. Finally, one should know that the tone of direction can and should change over the course of a project (for example: from an exploration tone to a decisive one).

The topic of fear in leadership could probably fuel another full roundtable.  However, there were still a few people who had expressed interest in voicing questions, so we moved on to their topics.

One person asked how, as a Lead Artist, one can go about growing their knowledge of business/management.  This is a good question as most artists come from an educational background focused on craft.  The first response was that, a Lead Artist likely already has a strong baseline, which in turn contributed to that person being selected for the role.  Nevertheless, there are still numerous resources available to grow your skills.  One attendee recommended books, while another recommended mentorship from more senior staff members.  Another attendee advised socializing with the directors when possible, and they also pointed out that alcohol can help the conversation.  Rather than creating a list of books this year, the idea was that you should start with the people first and then work towards the literature.  There are volumes of information one could explore on this topic, but getting the input of the people would help ensure that you're reading material is in alignment with your studio and your culture.

The final question of the day came from one attendee who wanted to know how much artwork was created when others entered the art director role.  The first response came from an art director at a small studio.  This person had to transition from a role where they might be called upon to do anything art related and, within the new role, couldn't devote as much time to creating art.  They struggled with delegation at first.  With time, they learned that managing could be rewarding.  However, they spend significantly less time creating art content, even at a small studio.  One art director indicated that they still have time to do art work periodically.  However, they try to pick up the least desirable work from the team, preserving desirable work for others.

One person indicated that the question itself had a problem.  The problem was that there is no practical way you can create art and lead at the same time; you have to sacrifice content creation.  Rather, the question should be how do you accept that leading is more important than art and  yet still carve out "creative time" for yourself.  If you can't accept that leading is more important, then you should probably be considering a different role.  However, if you need the time to creative time, they suggested that art directors carve out "office hours" in their schedule so that they have dedicated time at their desk.

Another attendee indicated that the type of creation also changes in the art director role.  The art director is responsible for the macro vision, so the majority of their creation time should be devoted to clarifying or correcting that vision.  Naturally, the vision is delegated through the leads to the individual members of the team, but the at desk time should be focused on the whole picture rather than a single asset/element.

Regarding the topic of office hours, one person posited the question of how to best deal with an absent, or "ghost," art director.  It was clear that this person was simply unavailable most of the time to provide feedback.  The simplest response from the group was to re-clarify the goals of ownership.  If the art director is unavailable, who can respond in their stead and what authority do they have.  Obviously, the art director could leverage leads or art managers in a number of different ways.  However, in this particular instance, clarification of roles and responsibilities was missing.

Thanks once more to everyone who attended the Art Leadership Roundtable.  I hope to see many of you again next year.

Speaker Evaluation

Art Leadership Roundtable: Day 3

Thursday, March 3 at 10:00 AM

Room 120, North Hall
------------------------------
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total Headcount: 95

Roundtable Session Ranking within Visual Arts Track: your session is ranked 10 of 14

Roundtable Session Ranking within GDC 2017: your session ranked 192 of 435

Session Totals (This Session)
Response
Count
Percentage of Responses
Excellent
17
63%
Good
10
37%
Poor
0
0.00%
Terrible
0
0.00%


Comments


  • Keith did a great job facilitating this roundtable. Awesome conversation was generated. I am a Lead Tech Artist and I found it tremendously helpful in gaining insight in working with Art leadership.
  • I saw another table introduce a speed-round with a short topic like "what's one thing you learned in the past year you'd like to share. you have 30 seconds, go" - it's a great starter for a round table as it involves lots of people and quickly gets everyone energized. Useful also at the 30min mark
  • Great conversation today!
  • A very good session, well organized even though the form is elastic and can be chaotic. Everyone had their chance to speak and discussion was calm and specific. I get a lot of useful for me informations
  • Lots of useful information being shared, but with how many devs were attending with very high levels of experience, I can't help but feel that it might be more useful to compose the room/session as a series of smaller roundtables distributed with a mix of devs across experience levels, and then have any particularly strong lessons/insights get broadcast across the whole session. One of the most valuable experiences for younger devs at GDC is just being around and getting to talk to vets, and when you've got a roundtable that large I think you find that only devs with mid-level or higher experience are comfortable talking or asking questions. If you break it into smaller subgroups all part of a larger session you can have far more conversations going simultaneously, put less pressure on the new people so they can be more comfortable speaking, and maybe even allow some degree of specialization within the roundtable, e.g. one circle is dedicated to progressing your career and the differences between being an art director vs art lead, one is dedicated to discussing technical art techniques and pipeline etc. The format itself of having devs of all experience levels gathered in a room to talk freely on a specific topic is great, it's what many people come to GDC for. But I think you should bump the session time up to an hour and half, and subdivide the room into groups so that the density of conversation can be much higher. As it is now, all the roundtables I've attended lose 1/3rd of the session time just to waiting for mics to get passed or people not wanting to talk over each other.
  • Interesting that the issue of "fear" seemed to take up about 70% of the discussion. We clearly need to give our art leads better management training... Having the two CAs to help with microphones was really useful.

GDC 2018 - Art Leadership Roundtable - Day 2


On the second day of the roundtable, we started by focusing on artist career progression.  The key question focused on which studios were working through the development of career ladders.  The first participant to chime in came from a studio who was building a new system for career progression.  In this particular instance, the studio had operated for ~10 years of generic titles.  The problem with this scenario was that there was no sense of progression for anyone.  In response, the studio established a range of titles including associate, mid, senior, associate director, and director.  The trick in building the progression system was to develop leadership roles that did not require people to become develop as managers.

In contrast, another attendee referenced their own smaller studio (~25) who likewise wanted to build a career progression path without requiring leadership/management advancement.  Due to their size, they avoided traditional titling built around ranking language.  Rather, their titles focus primarily on the work or job function.  There is a career path, but clearly they've created a culture that doesn't rely on specific language.

Another participant shared the idiosyncrasies of their particular studio.  This studio has created 5 tiers of the senior, although the speaker referenced a hidden sixth level that no one can achieve.  We could probably have done another 15 minutes on the idea of unused or unreachable career levels.  However, this studio allows for a lot more employee movement between roles.  In these cases, the studio simply appends the prefix "junior" to a role (implying that it is not integrated into the title).

One problem that studios potentially face is when there is inconsistency between internal titles and industry titles.  In the particular case, the studio opted to build five new tiers of progression.  They kept the roles (such as lead or director) separate from titles.  However, the studio did recognize that roles with more responsibility require a higher degree of service.  Naturally, this opens the question as to whether or not the role should earn more pay.  That then leads down the route of asking whether or not the increased in pay should result in higher tier or different title.  The attendees seemed to generally agree that conflating role with pay was more problematic.  In this particular instance, the studio resolved the problem by instituting the title of "veteran."  This title communicated the proper level of seniority, respect, and recognition without being built into the roles on the project.  However, a problem still remained: almost everyone with the veteran title was a founder in the studio.  To ensure that new employees understood what veteran meant, the studio also established the expectation/responsibility that new employees are mentored by veterans.

One attendee then expressed a very specific problem their team was facing, and we spent a fair amount of time investigating this topic.  This person worked in a large studio system and was looking at creating a new job family, specifically oriented towards cinematic design.  This new job family would be comprised of a variety of different developers including animators, cinematic artists, and character artists.  As with other groups, they were looking to develop a system that split craft from leadership (as a career path).  They were also looking at Croner's salary data to reinforce was the salary brackets for this new group.  They also wanted to set up this new job family for success by establishing solid mentorship practices, oriented towards feedback, training, and team motivation.

Many attendees chimed in on this particular topic with a variety of suggestions of what to be mindful.  It was suggested that this new job family identify and recognize skill variation, such as what makes the department unique or different from similar departments.  As new roles are developed, make sure there is clarity in responsibilities.  Talk openly with all stakeholders about where the challenges are and how you'll work to resolve those that are expected as well as the unexpected.  Finally, as much as possible, reduce overlap in responsibilities so that there are decreased opportunities for conflict between this job family and other groups/departments.

It was also suggested to be clear how you will identify the metrics for success in this new job family.  Be clear about who is responsible for the success of the new group.  Develop a progression of criteria for how success is to be evaluated and solicit buy in from all in leadership positions within this new group.  As the group develops, refine your goals as needed and make those goals public.  Don't forget to identify the pain points throughout the process and log what strategies are effective/ineffective.

The last component of this topic was addressing the issue of "overspecialization."  The concern revolved around crafting individuals and groups that were so focused in one specific realm that they might lose sight of their role in the larger family.  Naturally, the most significant group who can be mindful of such an occurrence is the leadership team.  However, it was also suggested that they avoid creating situations where new roles have no clear title or career path.  In short, avoid creating "one-off solutions" meant to address a specific problem, which runs the risk of evolving into a bottleneck in the workflow.  Another comment was to watch out for organizational stagnation.  If you rely on a variety of individuals for specific skill sets, you run the risk of creative burnout and departures.  The end result being holes in your development process, where it is difficult to backfill positions (failing the bus test).

The final topic of the day came from an attendee who was curious about how to build systems (or culture) for people to openly express frustration or ask questions.  The range of responses included encouraging managers/leads to have more direct conversations during one-on-one meetings.  Of course, the managers would have to make it safe, but find ways to encourage team members to be unafraid of expressing negativity (while still trying to keep the conversation productive).  Another attendee pointed out that frustration can often be a symptom of burnout, and so leadership should try to be solicitous of whether or not team members are working in areas that still generate interest/excitement.  Related to this, leaders should also work to help team members understand how their contributions relate to the team's larger success.  Likewise, ensure that team members are being challenged to learn and grow their skills.

Obviously, the second day covered a range of topics.  In fact, the session ran a few minutes late, so we had to call the roundtable to an end, and I encouraged attendees to show up once more on Friday for Day 3.

Speaker Evaluation

Art Leadership Roundtable: Day 2

Thursday, March 22nd at 4:00 pm

Room 215, South Hall
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total Headcount: 107

Roundtable Session Ranking within Visual Arts Track: your session is ranked 9 of 14

Roundtable Session Ranking within GDC 2017: your session ranked 178 of 435

Session Totals (This Session)
Response
Count
Percentage of Responses
Excellent
12
71%
Good
4
24%
Poor
1
6%
Terrible
0
0.00%


Comments



  • Always a highlight of my time in GDC, this was a great conversation particularly well moderated. My only contention is less to do with the event, and more that consistently all the attendees used the male pronoun pretty much consistently - I don't know how we could do it but I would love it to be more inclusive 
  • Today's talk about artist progression and roles was informative but didn't really expand into something applicable for smaller studios
  • I really appreciated the focus of this session- this is a real leadership issue in studios and it was great to hear discourse and ways other studios have approached it. 
  • What a phenomenal conversation today! I'm always impressed with the caliber of these roundtables but this one really knocked it out of the park.
  • I think this Roundtable was not as good as the one at Day 1 and Day 2. All hour was about one topic (names of different professions and advance level in companies). It was interesting but not very useful knowledge. Still, the talk was organized very well and discussion was well balanced.
  • Info not really helpful—uninteresting

GDC 2018 - Art Leadership Roundtable - Day 1


For the first day of the Art Leadership Roundtable, I asked the attendees to share experiences around the topic of "creative autonomy."  I was inspired by Andrew Maximov's talk a few days beforehand, and this seemed like a good starting point for the conversation.

One attendee shared a bit about their how their own role evolved as a studio moved from 40-60 employees; they had to shift away from content creation towards leadership.  I realized that I had phrased the topic poorly, and instead encouraged individuals to share any problems that they had experienced with "creative ownership" and then offered the option of sharing solutions if their studio had found useful changes.

Another participant chimed in that their studio had grown from 300 to 500 employees.  As the studio was building more art teams, they identified the need for more leads.  However, these leads had to also absorb more production work during the studio's growth.  Unfortunately, there was no training for those who found themselves in new leadership roles.  Sadly, this is a common statement at the roundtable, an issue that many studios seem to be facing.

In response to this situation, the studio implemented new processes for artists and leads alike.  Obvious processes included documenting career paths and ensuring one-on-one feedback.  Moreover, leads were encouraged to develop more "motivational understanding" in order that they can identify opportunities for creative ownership.  However, the participant also referred to areas of "resistance" from within the organization.  Naturally, all of this represents change and some amount of resistance is not unreasonable.

The topic of resistance was worth exploring further, so we talked about how resistance was addressed when and where it was encountered.  One of the first tools in addressing resistance was leveraging manager influence.  Managers provided employees an opportunity to express their frustration/concerns/resistance and, where possible, managers could reframe expectations and/or goals.  Second, the studio recognized that establishing cultural touchstones was just as important (maybe more) than documenting career paths.  Establishing a shared culture aids alignment.  In addition, the leaders actively worked to reinforce individuality where the work or the group might feel more like a "cog in the machine."  Lastly, where possible, HR was used to reinforce the changes to structure and culture.

As a final note on the topic of ownership vs. cog-in-the-machine, the production team was also instrumental in aiding the studio's shift.  For one, the production group worked to reinforce the vision and values of the creative leadership.  More importantly, production made sure that the creative decisions were coming out of this group and actively avoiding an environment in which it felt like they (production) were making development decisions independently.  It was implied that the studio's rapid growth had led to employees feeling as if this were the case.

We next talked about strategies on how to shift a studio away from top down (assuming that is your goal).  Many attendees chimed in and offered this variety of options.  Actively moving away from micromanagement is critical.  In some cases, studios are delegating ownership over the work and allowing the team to define the work/solutions and then the leadership influences the conversations around the broader goals.  As such, the studios work to shift conflict to discussion around the goals rather than conflict around the solutions.  Other studios have set aside time for experimentation, which in turn has led to new features.  In another instance, a studio invests more up front time in the brainstorming, to previz, to prototype approach to development.  Those who shared seem to be moving away from spec documentation and instead focus on rapid R&D at a very high level.  Consistently, the studios who are attempting this approach are embracing a creator-centric environment that focuses less on paper-design and documentation (and knowingly accepts the cost).  Referencing back to the earlier topic of resistance, these studios consistently recognized resistance as a key contributor in wasted development time.

Another attendee shared their studio's specific approach to creative development.  This studio used the term of "cutting the diamond" as a metaphor for iteration.  They still retain some top-down approaches such as planning weeks led by project directors.  However, the target of those planning weeks are to enumerate the high-level goals and the criteria for success.  From that, the teams then extrapolate the mid-level goals for themselves.  The biggest hurdle they faced in this approach was creating clarity around high-level goals with becoming too prescriptive in how those goals were to be achieved.

At this point, the conversation diverged into some specific scenarios for creative ownership.  The attendee who voiced this question was coming from a smaller studio with virtually no titles.  As such, everyone had peer relationships and no defined authority over others.  As such, they naturally relied on influence, a pure meritocracy of ideas.  So, ownership is present, but the organization has to be careful that it doesn't slip into a "loudest voice wins" culture.

Another attendee shared in this experience, coming from academia.  This person was frustrated with the bureaucracy of their institution, which in turn was leading to a de-evolution of authority and ownership (both for faculty and students).  Academia is critical in training developers who move into studios.  At the same time, the only person who has any true authority is the instructor (which is why team projects can be a mess at times).  Likewise, there is no market upon which to assess the success of the work.  Students have ownership, but instructors and academia have to evolve the same type of creative gates that most studios contend with regularly.

With the roundtable having reached a pretty good pace of conversation and flow, we then opened the floor to a new topic.  In response, one attendee asked what the focus should be for the Art Director between creative vision and production (creating art).  There were a variety of responses along these lines.  Unsurprisingly, in smaller studios, the Art Director is still expected to create content.  In fact, there was a lot of flexibility expressed on the amount of art content creation.  However, there was very little flexibility around owning the creative vision -- the AD is consistently expected to retain that responsibility.  In addition, several people spoke to their evolving understanding of the AD role over the course of their career.  For more junior developers, the assumption is that the AD spends the majority of their time and energy on the creative aspect of the role.  It's worth noting that most of the ADs I speak to each year wish that were the case.  For more experienced developers, there is the realization that the AD really spends the majority of their time in meetings, developing plans, resolving conficts, and thinking about how to keep the team aligned.  What is also worth noting is that, regardless of how the AD chooses to balance their work between creation and vision development, the most important thing is that balance is found rather than the constant back-and-forth reaction, and this is most often achieved by having a good support structure (comprised of leads, producers and peer directors).
Another attendee asked how art departments were managing their way through severe organizational changes.  A small period of time was spent talking about adding more focused layers into the organization, such as art managers and associate art directors in support of primary art directors.  Ultimately, the most critical component across those who contributed was the need to "keep the team together" and not losing sight of human capital.  In the end, the structure is only one tool that reinforces the alignment of the department.  Preserving the culture of the team, assuming that is desired, should drive any decisions in organizational change.

One of the final attendees to speak up asked how an Art Director interprets all of the input/feedback they are bombarded with on a day-to-day basis.  A few chimed in with some clear high-level thought processes:
  • Know what needs to be done.  It's not always what you want.
  • Know what the team needs.  If they don't have it, they won't achieve what needs to be done.
  • Know what others love.  Leverage the individual strengths of the team members.
  • Understand different career paths.  To clarify, this might be more specific to an Art Manager than an AD at larger studios
Related to the concept of defining the career path for artists, there are some pitfalls to help others avoid.  Some critical topics of conversation include:
  • Think of yourself as a game developer first, and an art specialist second.  Apply this same rule to your peers in other departments.
  • Disincentivize others from leadership roles by not having them tied to financial gain.  Leaders should be drawn to the roles by the challenges of leadership, not by paycheck.
  • Clarify that the Art Director role is not the top of the career ladder.  Ensure that there are other paths for craftspeople that are not interested in leadership roles.
It was clear from the conversation that the person speaking had encountered a challenged AD.  We spent a small amount of time exploring what created the challenge.  I won't rehash the details here; however, I strongly encourage any interested readers to go back to previous years' roundtables where we explored this topic in greater depth.

Speaker Evaluation

Art Leadership Roundtable: Day 1

Wednesday, March 21 at 2:00PM

Room 215, South Hall
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Total Headcount: 143

Roundtable Session Ranking within Visual Arts Track: your session is ranked 14 of 14

Roundtable Session Ranking within GDC 2017: your session ranked 288 of 435

Session Totals (This Session)
Response
Count
Percentage of Responses
Excellent
16
62%
Good
6
23%
Poor
4
15%
Terrible
0
0.00%


Comments


  • No issues
  • I didn’t know that other people would be able to talk about their experiences, but it was amazing. A lot of us are in the same boat at our jobs and we all have the same questions and experiences. It made feel like I was not alone. 
  • Really great way to exchange ideas solutions and contact.
  • Unfortunately in this case actions speak louder then words thus this almost seems like a waste of time. Not sure how to make this roundtable more practical. Though I must say the host did the best he could, he was engaged and listening, participating. But to me 90% of the words spoken by the participants were...unnecessary.
  • Fascinating, and slightly reassuring to hear that the same studios have suffered from similar issues that I have experienced. Wish I had not missed the first half, would have liked to have been able to attend the other sessions on this topic. 
  • Interesting Roundtable session. Well organized and well balanced - everybody was welcomed in the discussion. Also, I love that the notes will be shared^^
  • I think the moderator did a good job keeping people on track on the conversation flowing. However the conversation did get scattered at times, and I think it could still use more focus. It was nice to have all art leads in one room and I think that was the best part. I suggest an art lead happy hour for networking.
  • Very interesting