Breaking Down Barriers: How Great Mentors Become Even Greater Leaders

[Music] hello and welcome to my talk breaking down barriers um how great mentors become even greater leaders bit about myself uh my name is Andy I am currently a uh game director at Ubisoft Toronto I've been making games since uh 2005 and I found myself on both sides of mentorship um before that I was many different things game designer principal designer lead you name it why am I giving this talk well throughout my career I had mentors myself that supported me whenever I needed them uh these were the people that I had met at events such like this one um or through common friends that introduced me to them usually those were people I trusted sorry about that those were also people um who

always listen to me they always made sure to uh give me advice and they also showed me how big of an impact a mentor can have and also inspired me to give back as a marginalized staff myself I also want to support others and open new opportunities for them all of the experiences that I'm talking about today are based on my own experiences uh at various different companies so it's not just one uh specific experience so in my talk today I want to touch on a few things I want to give you a better idea of both sides of the experience being a mentor but also being M Mt I want to take a closer look at what a mentor does and how mentorship uh can generally affect uh your leadership skills and lastly I also want to take a look at who can be a mentor but let's jump straight into the mentorship experience so I've been lucky to have had experience with uh game devs that supported me very early throughout my

career uh they introduced me to their friends they um also told me to maybe chat with people that they thought uh were beneficial to me um or that I should just basically hang out with um and they also helped me form my own network uh they also shared their own experiences with me um sorry I'm just having technical difficulties at the same time um they shared their own experiences with me and um also crucial information um that also help helped me anticipate uh some of the issues uh that people can face uh throughout the career I've also had a lot of questions about my own job and about best practices and about being a good game designer and different approaches and my mentors always managed to listen to me they took their time to give me feedback and to give me advice about those things most importantly they always believed in me they always had my back throughout each stage of my own career they were always there for me they always listen

um they were just really the the backbones that helped me uh especially when imposter syndrome hit they always managed to reshift my focus back to what my strengths are and what my achievements are and just keep me focused on that they also inspired me to give back uh and again become a mentor myself and one of those things how to become a mentor uh was basically I joined the ambassador program at Ubisoft Toronto uh which is basically a opportunity for game devs to become more involved in the local community um to help and support younger devs but also youth each program that you actually see on on the slide uh tries to open new opportunities uh for students that are either transitioning from the work uh school life to work life um but also again younger students who are interested in transitioning into um a career in Game Dev and all of those program programs

have one thing in common they all have a very strong focus on mentorship and on coaching and training working with Elementary and secondary students uh for us really focuses on teaching them the basics of a creative process and also how to creatively figure out some of the solutions uh to the problems they come um face uh when they uh learn the creative process from us I also Mentor outside of Ubisoft which uh happens on a much smaller scale hopefully equally impactful um but that happens in my free time which basically means that it's not as consistent as when I Mentor with Ubisoft directly um it's really dependent on my available time and just generally also sometimes life events so what does it mean to be a mentor I see two main aspects where a mentor can actually really help younger devs number one would be supporting them uh in developing their own skills and

also how to maneuver the industry in a safe way but really it all starts with active actively listening to your mentees pay attention to what they're saying it's not just the words that they're saying it's the body language uh it's everything um that you should be uh take into account also trying to avoid distractions create a safe space a distraction free space where they can speak freely don't look at your phone don't prepare counterarguments in your head while they're speaking let them speak and be be active in your listening skills also generally show them that you're listening when they're talking to you again with your facial expressions with your body um ask clarifying questions if you need them uh encourage them to continue making their points uh just be there and be present in that conversation and also be honest in your responses try to be respectful try to treat them the way you uh they want to

be treated um but be honest when you give them feedback also try and introduce them to best practices that means you can point them towards useful resources um or any sort of Tool uh that can be articles that can be books that can be any sort of talk or video that is beneficial and relevant to them also make sure to review the projects um that is where you can give them the most actionable feedback that they can directly apply and try and teach them about known methods uh again that can be directly applied to the projects that is usually the most efficient way to uh show them uh relevant tools and what that means for them and also try and show them your own work examples if they're not under NDA because those are usually um things that help them the most and this mostly focuses on job specific skills but it's also really important to improve their core skills which generally are uh communication

skills um taking preparing feedback uh presentation skills um just generally being part of a team um and having those skills ready also try and set realistic uh gold posts that are achievable they're not too far away um help them stay focused uh and keep them on track on on these uh gold posts if they're too far away um that can end up in frustration it can feel like they're not making any sort of uh progress because they're just too far away to see that progress uh one of my mentees um she wasn't sure if she was supposed to be a programmer or a systems designer um so we had a lot of conversations and she talked about her Capstone project um during that conversation um it really showed what her strengths is a systems designer are and she also had a few leadership skills that kind of um shown through and I try to summarize all of

this I give her my perspective um especially as someone who's hiring systems designers I could give her my feedback on the different Pathways that she could take especially with some of the leadership skills um that she showed and that feedback also allowed her to kind of see the strengths herself gain some confidence and apply at a Sony studio where she's at now and she feels like that's the right path that she's taken it's also important to have a trustworthy uh support Network and also how to build one a lot of my students or a lot of the the mes that I talk to they tell me that their uh teachers tell them to bring a lot of business cards and then go to an event and um give as many business cards to as many people as possible but that's not the right way to network um you should focus on um making this meaningful connections with the people that you meet at those events uh engage in interesting conversations with those people they all have interesting things to say and tell you you um but

primarily you're trying to make friends when you're networking and if you if you meet someone who is maybe not the right person who has the right answers for you or is just not just not the right person um they may be able to actually connect you with other people who may be the right person for you um and that also helps you grow your network and by sharing your own experiences as mentors uh we give mentees a framework that they can use in similar situations by telling them how we handle certain situations like a difficult conversation or a difficult situation at work um we're also helping them uh spot those things uh when they encounter those similar situations and it also helps them handle the situation when it comes up in a responsible and a safe way that is also not harming their career as a marginalized Dev myself I also want to be honest with my mentees I think it's really important to uh to

tell them what they can face throughout the career um that there are microaggressions um that happen um there's discrimination that they can face and there's different types of harassment that can happen and that's not a great and uh positive topic to talk about but it's really important um and it's also important to talk about the tools that they have available um mentally and legally when they face those situations but even more important um is to create opportunities um to get people into the industry at Ubisoft Tonto we have one program that uh we call develop and that is meant to be an entry point for women nonb non-binary people and two spirit people who are interested in becoming game designers programmers and producers and in this program we had one one of our first participants greatly impressed us with uh with her entry with her interview um she won the contest um

and we really loved working with her and then she went back to school um and took other internships but once she was done with school uh we really wanted her back and she's now actually one of the new mentors of the same program that actually made it happen for her to get into the industry while keeping all of these things in mind um it's also important to understand what mentorship is not uh it's not a one- siiz fits-all solution everyone is different uh individual problems really require individual Solutions so figure out what's best for your Mente all my mentees that I've spoken to they come from so many different backgrounds they have so many different various levels of experience um every single one needs their own solution and their own support um and it needs to be addressed on an IND individual level it's not just something that you can take from a textbook also understand the difference between telling and teaching um telling

doesn't give them the reasoning it doesn't give them the context they don't understand why but when you teach them you actually give them the right tools you give them the context and they are now able to apply that same type of thinking uh to similar situations when they when they come up later also very important point mentorship is not for profit mentorship is very different from coaching it's different from master classes or pet speaking opportunities when we charge money for uh uh for mentorship we're gatekeeping information and we gatekeeping resources um and we purposely keep specific people from benefiting from our experiencing and from our support so when we don't charge for mentorship we even the playing fields and we make mentorship more accessible and we also lower the barrier of entry and not only for the more privileged people so how does being a mentor actually build build leadership

skills so I actually took a look at my own experiences on both sides being a leader being led by other people um and I also talked to a bunch of other people uh to figure out what they think uh good leadership is and so this is my list of what I think it is um good leaders are able to communicate well and are also able to listen they're eager to broaden their own Horizons and they can also help develop strengths and open pathways they are also able to give ownership to their own team members they're able to show empathy and respect and they also take responsibility uh for their team's well-being and their growth and I want to take a look at some of those points uh in more detail so the listening skills that I mentioned before the active listening skills those can be applied to both your mentees and your team members um to support them in their growth uh you need to better understand who they are and where they come from and also where they want to go it's really important for you

uh and your mentees and also team members uh to know that they are hurt they're understood and they feel supported by you most solutions for the problems really rely on you listening and you understanding who they are a good leader is also able to give meaningful and actionable feedback um which are based on facts and not necessarily on emotions SBI is a method that I like to use use that removes uh the emotional aspect and really focuses on describing what the situation at hand is um SBI quick uh reminder stands for a situation behavior and impact um so it really breaks down the situation into what has been observed um and gives that feedback as neutral as possible and with your mes when you use that method um your the Dynamics are different and you don't have that stressful environment of your project you don't have deadlines you don't have

to worry about performance review or anything so it's really a good way to practice giving that type of feedback and then once you're comfortable be able to apply it in the more professional context of your own project at your own studio also make sure that you tailor your feedback to your audience there's a difference between coaching an intern or a senior developer your mentees will come from many different backgrounds and they will have many different experience levels mentoring mentoring all those different people means that you have to learn to adapt the information to fit the knowledge level to fit the experience level that they have and that same can be applied to your team members your team members will most likely have different levels of experience and so to coach them more meaningfully without overburdening or mayy being too basic um you need to be able to tailor your feedback based on who's hiring um teams can be very homogeneous and that means that specific viewpoints

experience maybe Miss from that group and sometimes that means that managers are unable to anticipate the support that the team needs or potentially may need um or just to be aware of some of the obstacles that the team the teams can face um just be reminded that not everyone sees and experiences the world in the same way as you do so if you have mentees from different backgrounds they can show you the world that they live in they can shift your perspective they can give you um a new Viewpoint that you can take as a manager and be prepared for when your team grows and the more you work with people from different backgrounds uh the more you learn about the individual struggles as a manager that means that you can now be more proactive in anticipating and removing obstacles uh before they actually become an issue for your team members and it also allows uh managers to be more empathetic and create a positive and a safer environment at work

um for example if you have someone uh who joins your team who observes Ramadan and you know exactly what that means uh you're also more aware that maybe you don't set up the team lunches during this time uh and also be more aware of the workload the deadlines that you're um requesting during this time very important it's totally okay and fine to have questions as a mentor learning is not a one directional thing as as a mentor you can learn so much from your mentees show your genuine interest in uh topics that you don't know enough about ask genuine questions show that you're actually willing to broaden your Horizon and you're willing to uh fill your information gaps with uh information from your mentees if your studio has resource groups um that's also a great resource talk to them get some more information uh educate yourself most importantly don't dump all the

research uh onto your mentees or your team members that is still your that's that's still your job and be aware of what you don't know and just be open to learning about others people's uh realities some managers tend to be U somewhat restrictive in the decision-making progress by excluding their team members from it so on the short term that might be a timesaver um but it also strips your team from owning the work and owning the decision-making process and the decisions that come out of it so try and take a step back and allow them to come to their own conclusions Without You micromanaging and by working with human tees um and learning how to use guided questions um you can come become more comfortable with that process and again that process really helps um your

mentees and then also your team members figure out their own Solutions and it really gives them ownership over that process removing this can actually lead to learned helplessness it can also lead to your team members uh emotionally and mentally um distancing themselves from the projects or the features that they're owning um and they become people who execute things but they're not actually involved anymore so once you are actually more comfortable with us those guiding questions uh you can also apply that again to your team members uh even with that external pressure of uh the project and the deadlines and whatever comes with being part of a project the iterative process is a major part of making games um we do it all the time we hypothesize we implement we test we review we go back we rinse and repeat so failing is a major part of the creative process and failing is in is essential in figuring out what works and

what doesn't work so when we're making games um we actually need to be comfortable with making the mistakes because they're an essential part so when you work with your mentees make sure that you set up a space that they're comfortable in where they can mistake where they can make mistakes and go through that trial and error process and again this is all about becoming more comfortable with uh those methods so once you've trained that with your mentees you're also more comfortable setting up that same framework at work with your project becoming a safety blanket for your team so that things don't escalate um but really all of this basically means that you can set up something for your team uh to safely iterate U on their features as a mentor um most of the time you will break down more complex ideas into simpler Concepts or you have to prepare information for people that have very different uh experience levels and that

usually requires a deeper understanding of the subject matter by trying to teach others you basically also have to learn the thing yourself and that also helps you gain new skills but really as a manager uh you need to research tools you need to research methods uh you need to stay on top of things um that are relevant for your team to perform well so breaking being able to break down that information summarize uh any sort of important material and document it in a clear manner so that all of your team members of all the different experience levels can use that documentation is an essential part of being a manager very similar to this uh learning about new tools best practices um is a great way to grow your own skill set by staying on top of the latest trends uh you can actually Provide support for your mentees you can help them grow with that and that knowledge uh is also applicable to your team there's a trend there by the way um being able to

provide useful resources the tools or being able to set up uh tools and pipelines uh that make your team's jobs easier is really what is part of being a good uh manager and um as a mentor most of the time you'll try and support your main tees figuring out what the strengths are um but also where there's room for improvement you're able to look at a bigger picture and actually help them see what the strong areas are and then also how to identify the goals how to improve um and break down those goals into smaller realistic sub goals so that your mentees and then also your team members can follow those sub goals to reach the big goal and again that same thing applies to your team members but you probably have more resources available you can point them to training that is relevant um there's probably other resources that your studio has to train them but in both cases uh it's it's really to set up uh really important to set up the

achievable goals to be able to clearly identify those smaller subg goals and avoid setting up those unachievable ones that again what I've mentioned before they can end up in frustration because your mentees or your team members don't actually see progress when they work towards a bigger goal as a mentor you're also always responsible for setting up a safe environment for uh your team or for Humanes and this is the environment where you should try and lead by example so words are not the only thing your actions need to support your words example going to the previous uh example before if you want to have an environment where people can make mistakes don't punish them for making mistakes and it's also important that all your team members or all your mentees from different backgrounds are really comfortable in the space that you've created they have a voice they

don't feel threatened or silenced by anyone they are able to use the voice in that space without being afraid of of doing so and sometimes you have to guide conversations to make sure that the space is still safe and important is most important is you'll get feedback you'll get feedback from your mentees from your team if someone is not feeling safe in that space that you've created you have to listen to that and you have to make the required changes and sometimes that can also mean that you have to maybe change your own behavior showing awareness and respect that can come in many different forms learning about religious and cultural uh holidays and practices uh informing yourself about lgbtq plus topics staying on top of political events on a smaller scale um if you have team members from different cultures make it Mak sure that you pronounce their names

correctly being respectable means that you're empathizing and that you are creating an environment that allows both your mentees and your team members to be comfortable being themselves in that space Also try and have an aware awareness of um situations and how they can change some terms can uh be fine one day and then over time they change they can become hostile they can become offensive um you should be aware that this can happen uh and also when it happens so that you are able to quickly react to this change and then make sure that you change your environment back to a safe space for all your team members and that really requires you to be aware of this um and to a to be able to react fast to a crisis and to find a solution quickly and again what I've said before if you are unsure how to do that be comfortable in asking ask for more information ask for help reach out

in a respectful way again don't offload the whole work on your mentees or your team members your responsibility is to find a solution so don't overburden the people who are actually affected by this so having said all that um who can be a mentor uh you don't really need to be a manager to be a mentor you don't have to have a certain um experience level of course it helps but that's not that's not really necessary more senior people have more experience that makes sense and that is great but that doesn't mean that they're the only ones who should consider mentoring others peer-to-peer mentorship between more Junior developers is really beneficial to both parties uh experience levels knowledge uh they differ even even if you are a peer um you always have something that you can teach someone else and they can benefit from it and you're benefiting from it because

you are teaching those skills now same thing at work uh reaching out to a colleague that is very easy uh finding someone who can give you feedback someone who can give you guidance um this is a great way to find a mentor but mentorship is not only limited to your place of work try and reach out to other people try and reach out to people um at different companies different Studios do different things they have different pipelines tools approaches um and that's great for Learning and broadening your own Horizon also in general find someone that you can trust as a mentor and don't be afraid to ask people if they want to be your Mentor uh you'd actually be surprised how many people actually are willing to step into this role if they're approached and if you want to be a mentor um try and be vocal about this try and tell other people that you're available to be a mentor um but also at the same time be mindful of your own

resources and your own time that you're offering so what are the main takeaways we're basically always learning both as a Mente and a mentor throughout the different stages of our Career Development we're always growing we're always developing and there's always ways to benefit from a mentor mentee relationship mentoring opens New Perspectives for both the mentor and the mentee and it teaches us to see beyond our own limits and learn to be more empathetic mentors can create and share new opportunity opportunities and career paths especially for marginalized devs the industry has biases and as mentors we can actually remove some of the obstacles that are created by those biases and all the skills that are applied during mentorship are actually skills that improve leadership and management skills as a reminder not all mentors are managers not all managers are mentors but mentors learn the relevant skills they need to move into a management or

leadership position through mentorship doesn't mean that all the managers have had the same experience um giving mentorship but really anyone who wants to be a mentor can be a mentor you don't resp require a specific training if you have the drive to share your knowledge to share your experience to support others who can benefit from that support that's really all it takes and if you don't know if your studio offers mentorship opportunities just ask them and if you find out that there aren't any yet why not create your own opportunity why not find someone else who's also interested and then get the Stone Rolling remember becoming a mentor can make a change for someone it can even a playing field and it can open opportunities for others but it also helps you grow as a leader and before we move on to the question section um I want you to try and find your new

Mentor or find your new mentees when you leave this room thank [Applause] you hi uh hi great talk uh I really loved it um at the start of the talk you talked about um you should always look at the people you talk to and react to their body language um how do you do that in a online environment like um I struggle a lot with um just someone posting a picture or a video and just asked the question I need feedback and that doesn't really give you anything to go from so how do you uh handle that I think when when it comes to the online setting um there's still a few cues that

you can get right if the video is on you can kind of see the facial expressions that kind of helps you interpret what they're saying um but you can also take a look at how they are communicating and writing that kind of gives you a bit of of an idea how they're doing and and and what they're actually trying to communicate but it's really it is usually very helpful if you can if you can at least see them see their facial expressions um which again goes both ways when I say you also show them that you're listening um it is easier when you have your camera on and if you have a one-on-one if you have a uh a a small conversation um it usually helps if you if you use the camera as as a tool to be able to at least read the facial expressions if you can't see the um the body language okay thank you so much I've been a longtime Mentor I never got any training in mentorship I've just

kind of tried to figure it out on my own aside from this talk obviously um could you suggest any other resources that you might Point people to for um mentors who want to Mentor other mentors or for mentors who are seeking other mentors as mentors about mentoring or any other right or generally like how to just be a more effective Mentor um that's a very good question I think most of what I I've had as training actually came from the company and if there wasn't any training we approached the company to ask for it um so that was one of the the methods um I'm I would have to research if there's anything out there that is actually giving mentorship training that is not Studio specific a lot of what I've had was really talking to other people talking to other mentors kind of trying to find a a network of um and be able to exchange your experiences and kind of get some some some tips and tricks how people are approaching this and it kind of goes back to uh if if you

don't have that available maybe it's something that you can start setting up and reaching out to other people and kind of get that get that thing rolling to bring people together and talk about and exchange um about their mentorship uh tips and tricks and and experiences hi hi great talk uh thank you so much for that uh help a lot uh I want to ask you if you have any tip about for example when you want to be a mentor help people and bring the community together but in the same time you have to develop games deliver uh and all this MTH put sometimes for the mentorship as as as a priority that we we don't want but in in the same time being professional in and try to find the balance it's very hard uh in general so I yeah so that's that's kind of what

I mentioned before look at your time and your energy that you have available um again with with how to set up something um I I did just I I reached out to my my studio and I told him like I want to set up this thing but I can't do it on my own because as you said there's a project that you have to work on there's deadlines um so I got the company to actually help me uh They Drove all of the organization aspects uh the meetings um and I just had to be there and really focus on the mentorship aspect of things um so if that's an a possibility I would strongly suggest talk to your company talk to your studio talk to your team if if you have more people or if you have someone who's dedicated to kind of take over the organizational part that's amazing if you want to start small and there's no company or you just basically want to reach out to people and tell them I'm available as a mentor just be aware of of your energy of your own time of your

deadlines a lot of it comes from communication with your mentees right you talk about the frequency of how often do you want to meet how do you want to structure the mentorship and so you can also be you can be honest and very um you know just set up your constraints because as a mentor you also need the energy to properly give back thank you so much think that's [Applause] [Music] it