The Resilient Job Hunt: Addressing the 'Well of Doubts'

Hey guys. My name is Irina Hassanov and I am an independent 3D artist from Germany. I hope you had a great GDC so far. It's Friday. And yeah, this is our panel to see in job hunt addressing developed doubts. Did everyone click the right link? All right, then let's go. Now you might wonder why would someone like me Yeah, this would be me. Uh make this panel because I actually don't have much experience in the games industry. And the truth is that uh took me a while to graduate. Um first I finished my bachelor of science, then I acquired my 3D diploma, and afterwards as I graduated uh the whole pandemic started. And to find a job in the games industry, it felt actually impossible or at least it seemed this way. Mm.

But even before that, it really sounded scary and stressful to apply. But in the end it was so worth it. That's why I have put up this panel with five amazing individuals who do have jobs in the industry. Um they all work in different disciplines but are connected through their passion and love for games and their openness and willingness to share. So this is simply amazing. And I hope that you are someone who wants to take the same path as them and learn from their mistakes but especially their success stories because there will be a lot of those on this panel. So and if you are someone who already has a job in the industry, maybe you will feel inspired or something that they say resonates in you. And you maybe shared on similar experience. So we have prepared uh six relevant questions and everyone applicate uh everyone every new applicant should have when

facing developed doubts when it comes to applying into the games industry. So um meanwhile during our panel, feel free to ask questions uh in the chat and vote for your favorites. And so sit back and enjoy. Don't forget the questions. And let's welcome our panelists. Hey guys, please introduce your awesome selves. So let's start with Carlos. Hello everyone. First of all, it's amazing to be here. My name is Carlos Dana. I'm originally from Argentina. Currently I live in Stockholm, Sweden. I currently work for a consulting firm called Quick AB. And I work for several industries uh it game development being one of them. I have 6 plus years of experience as a software developer. And I met most of this most of the amazing people that are joining us today through volunteering like uh being a conference associate at GDC or

being a dev com as a volunteer. So it's a pleasure to be here with everyone. All right. And Dana. Hi everyone. I'm Dana Woodburg. I'm a 3D artist with a technical background. Right now I'm a um an artist at Fishbone Games in Berlin. It's a really nice small lovely studio that just uh started out and uh has its major focus on casual games. Um yeah. A little bit about myself, I discovered my love for 3D art in games uh during my time when I studied programming. But um instead of pursing pursuing with programming, um I really had to go into 3D cuz it's just so cool. At least for me. Um yeah, I have been part of around uh five ship mobile games and um two uh VR projects. And for 3 years now I uh you can also

find me on um bigger game and art festivals in Europe. Um In there I'm not only attending but uh sometimes also uh helping as a volunteer. Uh I'm also part of uh Women in Games uh and you if you ever come to Berlin, you will find me in several meetups in the Berlin community as well. Amazing. Jeremy. Hello. I'm Jeremy Likness, technical producer at Cryptic Studios. Uh been making games for about 8 years now. Uh while I was in college, I worked with uh a bunch of indie studios uh and then I've been working for uh professionally for about 4 years. Uh shipped a lot of different fun titles and a lot of really cool IPs. Um and uh met a lot of these exciting folks here on this panel uh at GDC through the conference associate program as well. Uh and very excited to be here. All right. Um

Sophie. Hi everyone. My name is Sophie Mintz and I am the community director at Donkey Crew, which is a small team based out of Poland but I currently live in the US thanks to the pandemic. I wasn't able to move just yet. Um recently we shipped our title Last Oasis into early access in March of 2020 and we just shipped onto the Xbox Game Preview in March of 2021. I have about 3 years of industry experience both in PC gaming and in the VR side of things. And I graduated with a BFA in illustration from Ringling back in 2016. That was also the first year I started volunteering as a conference associate like these other lovely folks at GDC. And yeah, I'm very happy to be here. And last but not least, Tatiana. Hi, my name is Tatiana and following on the trend of people who studied computer science but ended up not going into engineering, uh I started my career straight out of

school through the Microsoft uh Xbox intern program into game production. I had the opportunity to work on about six AAA games over a period of over 12 years. Um my career has taken me from Seattle to Sweden and now in Los Angeles. And most recently um me and a small crew of other experienced developers decided to take on the brave journey of starting your own game studios where I am running all things studio operations and production. Amazing. Okay, then let's move on to our questions and how this will work is that uh we have a main question and then we will ask questions around that must main question. So the first question would be regarding the job hunt and career planning, what do you know now that you wish you knew then? And Sophie, when I graduated, I couldn't find a job for 1 year and does that happen often to other applicants and is this considered

normal? Definitely. So like I said, I have a BFA in illustration and now I do community. Um I was applying to art jobs for, you know, most of my senior year and about 10 months after I graduated and I wasn't getting any interviews. I was only getting positive feedback on my portfolio but no one really wanted to hire me. That was okay. Like I had the realization that, you know what, maybe art isn't what I want to pursue anyways. So I was working at a very small little coffee shop in my hometown and then I moved to California without a plan in 2017 uh during GDC. Um managed to land a contract gig at Google doing customer support. That taught me a lot of really great soft skills um and I eventually was like moving up within that contract role and doing other components of like QA when

with people QAing people uh and training new customer support agents. During GDC 2018, I landed an interview with a small VR startup and I got the job and that was my foot in the door breaking into games. And so I had a lot of, you know, weird background stuff before I actually got into the industry and that's really normal. There's plenty of people within games that have decades long careers doing something completely unrelated. Um like I know someone who used to be a veterinarian and that works in games. So it's okay. Take your time. It's not a rush. Uh the games industry will be here. So if you see something that could give you experience that you think will help you in the long term, then go for it. But don't feel bad if you're not immediately breaking in. Yeah, I think it's completely normal to do something else in the meantime and yeah. Um Carlos, um something that you

wish you knew then, um what is that tool that helped you the most to find a job? Yeah, so for me it was uh LinkedIn more than anything. Uh when I was doing my master's degree, one of the people that in the fact in the university that focuses on basically putting people into different companies recommended me start working on your LinkedIn early on on your while you're doing your master's degree and so I did. So every single project I put I worked even if it is was if it was a game jam project or something completely unrelated to the game industry, I would put it on my uh LinkedIn and just get there. Also something I wish I knew back then, it was uh reach out to people. There are a lot of people in LinkedIn willing to lend a hand. If you see someone that has a position that is in a position that you are like

"Oh, I would love to work on that position in this company." Try to reach out. Usually, they will answer. And if they don't, at least you try. Uh lately, I've been trying to look more into Discord. I'm not very experienced on that areas, but I know a lot of people recommend that nowadays, and I I think there is only benefits. I know some Discord communities can be a little bit toxic, but most of them I think they are very good people, and also they are heavily moderated. So, those are the communities you want to be. I agree. Uh LinkedIn is a very powerful tool nowadays, and it's definitely worth it using it. Right? So, um Jeremy, um in your introduction, um you had a really long list of employers, and you must be a true resume pro by now. Please share your wisdom with us. Yeah, uh yeah, I wouldn't say I'm a complete pro. I don't think, you know, you're always you're always learning. I'm always learning myself. I actually, you know,

still take feedback and uh you know, take advice and after just looking after other people's resumes, right, as well. Um but just you continuing to uh tailor my resume towards job descriptions um instead of just, you know, having an overall resume. As you start building more experience, um you know, really tailoring your cover letters and your resumes towards the job description and the keywords in that job description are super important. Um so, you end up with a variety of different types of resumes. Um but you're always constantly improving it as the years go on, even as you um end up in the industry. Uh and when things happen and you have to dust off the resume, um you constantly are always improving it again. Um but, you know, uh if you know, in regards to the question at hand, uh you know, having you know, when I graduated, I submitted well over probably 500 applications after graduation. Um and just uh learning that that kind of, you know, sends your application and resume off into a vast sea of other resumes.

Uh I learned really fast that, you know, building relationships and people at the studios you want to work at is really important. Um and uh you know, like when I see a job that interests me, you know, I always make sure to go out and uh you know, look for somebody that I know at that studio. Um referrals usually end giving you interviews faster, um or at least some you know, guaranteeing you that at least a human being is going to read your resume. Um but then yeah, if it's one thing that I wish I knew then that I wish I knew now was, you know, instead of just applying to every job I saw, you know, actually taking the time and the effort and uh doing research in the position and reaching out to people at those jobs. Yeah, you heard him. That's actually stellar advice. Um all right, let's move on uh to the next question, and that that would be um what challenges did you face while networking, and how did you overcome them? So, Sophie, you mentioned previously that um Discord helped you to find a job. Can you share the story with us?

Yeah, definitely. Um so, Carlos mentioned a bit about how he's starting to start using Discord a little bit more. As a community manager, I Discord is my life. And so, when I first started working as a CM, I was invited to an industry server that's run by Discord community managers. And it's a bunch of people from different sides of the gaming industry, uh and it's where we all get to get to know each other a little bit better, see each other's work ethic, and how we parse through issues, and bounce ideas off of one another. And while I started to talk to people there and create some friendships, and get close to other people, um it was helpful because I needed to look for a job. And my current coworker was part of those servers, and had kind of become my friend because we had started having, you know, side conversations about whatever. And he knew that he liked my

work ethic, and that I would be a good fit for the team. And so, when I was looking for a job, he went "Do you Do you just want to work for us?" I was like "That's it? Like that's Do you want me to interview?" And he's like "Don't worry about it. Do you want to come work for us?" I was like "Yeah, that'd be great. Thanks." And now it's been over a year and a half, and it's I could not imagine myself happier on any other team, and it's been great. So, utilizing a space like that um is super beneficial, and there's plenty of other servers that are focused for college kids that are, you know, looking to start to speak to professionals within the industry. You can find them on Discord. You can find them through Twitter. Twitter's also really helpful platform when it comes to just kind of seeing what industry people are like, um and opening conversations with them. So, Discord and Twitter, they're they're great. Yeah, definitely. Especially right now,

we are most uh events happen online, right? So, that will be definitely a challenge which is overcome with the help of Discord. Okay, um Dana, you are in a position where you had to hire people. How did networking help there? Uh yeah, totally. Um um not only um I had to hire people, but our studio uh was looking um or is right now also again uh looking for for more support. And um I'm just this kind of person who really likes to to go to events uh cuz um for me uh I just love attending these events cuz you meet so many interesting people, and everybody has their own story as to to how they joined games, and every story is so individual. So, just meeting these people is already so inspiring.

Um and uh yeah, meeting people on events uh yourself that we cannot do right now um uh just really open up opportunities. Um Uh we we still have like the the platforms right now, but I'm really looking forward for for events being live and in person again. So, um you can You can, of course, find your your dream job, uh but uh you can also stumble into really inspiring conversations where you uh just just open your horizon to new adventures. And uh instead, um that can help you um shift your dreams to maybe a a new stop uh spot of light where it was dark before, and suddenly you see, "Oh, I don't have to do this one thing that I always dreamed, but there's more opportunities." Uh and maybe I don't um uh I I do like this new opportunity much much better than what I had imagined

before. So, just um going there um really talking to people um is is a good way uh to to just network as well. And um yeah, like you mentioned um or maybe you suggested that um just before the uh pandemic, um I was able to find uh one of our um um team colleagues. So, um the story is like this. Um uh I've I've just been to another um event in Berlin. It was an art event, and I was just uh already on a few events looking for our uh new UI animator. And um I was just talking to a friend, and just telling her I've been to this event and that event, and it's just no animators anywhere. And then she turns around and says, "Hey, look. My friend here is an animator, and she's looking for a new job." And uh it's it's so easy

sometimes to to just accidentally stumble upon a new opportunity uh right there without even uh sometimes without even looking, cuz she was not going to this event to find a new job. She was just considering um and um all of the sudden, um I was able to to say something on the event I was never able before, something like, "I will hire you." And it became true in the end. Um yeah, so on the event itself, we started talking. I noticed really quickly that uh she would be an an amazing fit. Yeah, that worked out really well for you, right? Um yeah, but speaking of events, um Jeremy, you were located in Wisconsin when you started your journey, right? Um did it make things difficult when it comes to networking? Yeah, uh a little bit. Uh you know, necessarily when you think of video game development, Milwaukee, Wisconsin on the top of that list, and that definitely was a thought that crossed my mind. Uh

uh I moved to that location because of family. Uh but after doing research, I found a good technical uh college where they had a a game industry program where I got my programming and design degree. Um but I also utilized uh that opportunity to, you know, real uh you know, branch out into areas where there was more of a game development community, uh like Madison, Wisconsin and Chicago, which weren't too far uh wasn't too far of a drive. Um you know, Madison having Raven and PUBG and Epic and Bethesda, and Chicago has EA and Jackbox and Volition and Iron Galaxy, and um so, there's definitely gaming communities in there, not so much in Milwaukee, but uh so, you know, just it was a lot of doing my research and homework and getting involved in the local community as much as possible in any events that I could attend. Um but then also uh uh setting up and starting up my own indie event with a local business in the Milwaukee area, where I invited other indie developers in the area to come show off their games and um uh that really uh that really helped um you know with

the a lot of the challenges of networking in my area. Uh I even went as far as showing off one of our indie games in Indianapolis in Gen Con uh driving all the way to Indianapolis from Wisconsin. Um but yeah uh and then just kind of going through all that. I was bartending my way through college and with all my previous experience in in life in the military and uh just utilizing all that uh soft skills uh in my non-gaming job uh and kind of taking that into all these events that I was going in. Uh and then eventually that led me to getting accepted at the conference associate program at GDC and the rest is history. Yeah, right. So, when the event didn't come to you, you came to the event and then at some point you just made an event yourself. That's really cool. Um Yeah, but I would like to move on to the next question and that would be um what does your company expect from employees that just graduated from college? You know, you just start out

and you're nervous. Um Yeah, Tatiana, you have now worked for in a AAA company and founded your own indie studio. Is there a difference between what a AAA company expects of you versus the versus the indie studio? Uh so I came as straight out of college into the industry and I'm super grateful that I had a path in and the one of the first employees for the new indie studio was an intern at Electronic Arts. So, I have this strong um desire to make sure that there's a good path for people to come in because they're you know they're awesome co-workers and really the future of the industry. And so with Fuzzy Bot constantly thinking about what would be the best way to bring new people into the company. I think at a very high level um between AAA and indie there there is a lot of common things that uh both groups would look for in somebody coming

straight out of college. There's just a baseline of core skills. Like if you're a programmer, you probably need to know C++. Um for example, I went into production but I had a computer science degree and that helped me be a good producer for small technical team starting out. And uh I think experience working in groups is useful as well because games is very much a team sport and so being able to coordinate and uh make decisions with others and bounce off ideas is really useful. But at a very very high level, what uh we always look for myself and uh at Electronic Arts and all the other studios is somebody that just has really high potential to grow and learn and a willingness to put in that effort into learning. So, we expect that anybody coming fresh from college or university into the games industry uh we expect to invest in them and that they don't know all of the things um and that it's going to be a journey together. And um

so there's already an expectation that we'll help you along the journey. I think one of the mistakes I personally made coming straight from school is I wanted to be perfect. I really wanted to get all the things right straight out of the gate and sometimes I just got stuck in these rat holes where I could have just asked and I think there's a delicate balance when you come out of school to do like try to figure it out yourself but also don't be afraid to ask for help so that you're not stuck. These days as like a senior member, I bounce ideas all the time before I dig into a problem. Uh so that's just something uh to prepare for. The main difference between indie and AAA is really uh kind of your focus. So, in an indie studio, we're really small group of people and all of us are expected to do a lot of different things outside of our core expertise. And I think things like culture and the processes would impact anybody coming in more just because it's so small and we're all need to be bought into the

company success. So, we're looking for people that are really excited about our mission, uh like the way that we approach development and it's really bought in at that level uh and then it's off to the races so to say. And I think in AAA, it's really structured. So, even if you come from a generalist background, you're probably going to get a task that's very specialized. Like there's 3D artists but they focus in character art or level art or hard surface art. So, your task will probably be more specialized or more focused and you will get a mentor who is very good in that item and some of the even maybe that small team around you will have more impact on your experience than the bigger studio depending on how big it is. Uh but overall just again um that kind of hunger to learn, grow and contribute to the team and the game uh and make awesome experiences for players is the common expectation from anybody jumping straight out of school. Absolutely. Doesn't matter if indie or

AAA, just show your motivation, right? And yeah, speaking of motivation, uh Carlos, you recently uh recently started a new job. Um what would you tell someone who just had their first day at the new company? Yeah, so what I would say is breathe take a deep breath and relax a little bit. No one is expecting you to come into the office the first day and start raking it raking in the code and fixing all the issues and fixing all the bugs. Uh I would recommend them to just uh be themselves. They don't have to demonstrate much because each company has their own way of working even if it is a small startup or a large company. So, uh I would say just that. Uh focus on the process. I'm going to echo everything that Tatiana said. This is a team sport

and your team is there to support you and help you out there. So, aside from that, take a deep breath and go. Go on like demonstrate that you're the best that you can do without without stressing yourself, I would say. Right. Last time you told me don't be afraid to make mistakes and it actually truly helped me in the new job. So, thanks for that. Um Jeremy, how can job candidates meet those expectations at your company? Um uh I mean we hire I mean we definitely uh look at a variety of different things. When I when we look at we're looking at portfolios that show off people's work. People put in the effort to actually you know show off show off what they're working on whether it be a GitHub or a website or um LinkedIn. Uh but love seeing candidates who put in the effort uh just not in college but also like try to put in some effort outside as well. Um you mean even if it's not just like a you know getting some simple games either on Steam or on the you know

Android store or the Apple store. Um games that are just not like global game jam projects, right? Um seeing seeing like you're taking the extra mile like to learn in school but also doing stuff on the side um goes a long way uh and just uh with you know someone who does their homework in into the studio and culture into the job at hand uh when when you're interviewing candidates uh you know when a candidate asks that question that could have been easily found like on our website uh you know it's you can you can you could usually tell pretty quickly when people don't do their homework. Um and uh a big thing for me is at least making an effort to play the games that you're applying for um even if you know they're not your forte. Uh definitely check out the games that you're going to be working on. I always highly recommend. Um and then uh another big thing for me is just someone who clearly understands chain of command and uh you know able to answer hypothetical questions uh you know like you not necessarily always looking for the right

answer. I'm just kind of seeing how your thought process is and where your brain goes to and kind of how you uh step by step go through issues and and situations. Um but uh but yeah echoing a lot of what has already been said. Um uh just you know we we uh just being yourself and and and showing enthusiasm and and being optimistic about the project and the job description at hand. Um I mean we just hired somebody I think straight out of high school. Um so it is possible uh uh to to accomplish that. Right, so be yourself but also take a look at the company that you're applying to, right? All right. The next question then. So, I think this COVID, a lot of things changed and how do you apply in interview for a job during COVID, right? It's not completely over yet. So, Tatiana, you actually founded uh

last year and you were brave enough to do this during a global pandemic. How did your applicants have to prepare for the application? So, one of the great things around having your own studio, it's not my own. Fuzzy Bot is a group of people that love Fuzzy we get to write the wrongs that we've experienced in other places. So, one of the things that was really important to me because I'm in charge of the hiring pipeline is that it's super easy to apply. That there is as few hurdles uh to actually put your name uh into the Fuzzy Bot pool as possible. So, we just have an email and then people send in you know a their resume hopefully in PDF format so that the formatting is all good on everyone's computer, with a little short intro about, you know, why they're interested in the company or what they're looking for in this particular role, and a little like

a little bit of a background. I'm not looking for cover letters. Again, I don't want people to do something extra. Your resume and your body of work should really speak speak on your behalf. But a little bit into the email itself of, you know, why Fuzzy Bot, why this role, or maybe you're just applying to the open requisite, like what what are you bringing to the table? There's something there. And I try to reply to every single person. One of the things that I look for is, again, we are an indie studio and we really need versatile people. So, what is it about you that would work really well in our studio? Are you a programmer who also does art? Are you coming straight out of school with a great degree, but you have experience running a really big Discord community? Like we're looking for any kind of things that would really help our studio fill all the roles with a small team. I'd say the big

difference from my experience on the AAA side is even for me as a person with over a decade of experience, sometimes the application process can feel a little bit like a black box. I've searched for different jobs. I've applied. I had an experience where I applied to a role, didn't hear back, and then like a month later recruiter from that role reached out to me and asked, you know, like, "Hey, your profile's great. Do you want to apply?" And I'm like, "But I did. I did. What happened?" Where did my application go? And I think my advice around that is um try to connect to somebody in the studio, especially in your discipline, because that person can give you great feedback, you know, if you don't have everything that that studio needs as a programmer, reaching out to a senior programmer, you can get feedback on what skills you might need to work on before you're ready to move forward. And if you keep following up with them, you can build a relationship and then they can help recommend you next time things open up. And in big studios, things open up all the time. So, even if it's not this particular role, but you really

want to join a studio, you can keep the conversation going. And even for Fuzzy Bot and AAA, I think seeing people who show interest and maybe ask for feedback, and then you give them feedback, and they come back in like 2-3 months showing progress, like you know, "Hey, we use Unreal. I see you don't have Unreal experience, and that's really important to us." And then somebody's like, "Hey, I've spent 16 weeks learning Unreal. Here's some cool stuff. Like still really passionate about this opportunity. You know what else?" Like that's really impressive, and that's something that goes from just, you know, one of many applicants to somebody who, "Hey, I really want to try to make this work. This person's really trying." So, that's the kind of been my experience. I'm really happy to be able to streamline the things with Fuzzy Bot that I had less control over at the previous videos. So, to summarize, don't spend too much time on the cover

letter, but let your work speak for yourself. And just keep it up. Don't stop after one application. Keep working. Right. Dana, how about you? Is there a difference between what companies expected from employees before and after Corona? Um so, um what stayed the same is basically everything that Tatiana just said and recommended. But something that does change right now is how we work. Since Corona, most of our team is working online. Um so, what does it mean for the interview process? So, we will probably like have the normal interview that we would normally have. So, a screening interview and um

what what that what then changed is basically that we will not have an office tour, unfortunately. We will do all our interviews online. And what what happens after that? So, how can I actually imagine working from from home? What How does this even work? You know, so we weren't really sure how that works before Corona, and we we did make it work. And um so, something that is always really important within game teams is that we have a constant feedback. Normally, we would walk around desks and then just casually start walking. So, talking. Um but what what we do now is we try to to simulate this artificially. And I think now certain things became much

better than we did before. So, we know how to to poke people better. We have artificial coffee chats where we have like literally just a meeting in the middle of the day where everyone we can come in just to take talk about random stuff around the the day or what they have been done during the weekend. Cuz this is something important that is just missing in this everyday interaction, right? So, something else that we started doing is there's this amazing tool online for for whiteboards. It's called Miro. And we have become super creative of that. So, since we do not have to wipe down a white whiteboard on in the meeting room, we now have these really big and interesting and really sometimes people can scribble in silly things there. We have these really versatile tools now

that we definitely going to keep using after Corona is done. And the most important thing that really helped us that Corona really helped us in our studio, what most of the studios do right now, is we have more flexible work hours. So, how does it look like now? So, obviously, we all work from home, but in the future, we definitely consider having for for people who want to work in the office, sometimes work in the office, sometimes work from home. We do have now um an expansion. Like I mentioned before, we were hiring. So, we have a small office in Berlin that is for up to 15 people, but we hired so many people now, 25, I believe was the last count. We do not even fit in this office anymore. And

um with that, working from remote also expanded our our way of working, not that we all work in the same location, but we also have different locations. So, we have people working with us from different cities inside Germany, but also from Poland, from Romania. And this these opportunities are just really great for people right now. And also, I guess after COVID is um history, that I think more more companies will open up these opportunities that you do not have to work inside an office with the people, but we have better and more ways how to to work remotely, and without like missing the opportunity to to

casually speak and talk to each other. Yeah, but I bet it would also help like to have some working from home experience. But if you're not working from home, at least having a project aside at home and working on it. Right? So, to build up the discipline that's necessary to work from home. Yeah. And obviously, the team will also support you there if you have questions. Yeah, that's really cool. Um Jeremy, um so, for applying, how do you go about asking for referral, especially if you don't know anyone at that studio that you want to apply to? Yeah, that's a great question. It's something I do that's gotten me all my jobs, for sure. It really depends on the situation at hand. If I already, if I don't know somebody, if I already know somebody at the studio on a personal or professional level, I'll usually reach out right away. Say, "Hey, and I don't you know, just start the conversation like, "Hey, I give me a referral." You know, I usually start the

conversation and you know, say, "Hey, like just so you know, I'm I'm really interested in this position, learning want to learn more about it, learn more about the studio, the culture. You know, do you have any insights? And then eventually like lead into that conversation if, you know, they'd be interested in in putting in a good word for me. If I don't know somebody, you know, I tend to you know, check out that studio on LinkedIn, check the you know, check to see if I if there are any recruiters that I can connect with. But then I also go and and look at my network and see does anybody that I know know somebody at that studio? This happens a lot in a lot of the social groups, Discord groups that you eventually become a part of. I know the conference associates do this a lot. They'll reach out to like on our Facebook group and say, "Hey, does anyone know anybody at Riot? Or does anybody know anybody at so-and-so studio?" And 99% of the time they usually get you usually one or two people or sometimes more to reach out to with those kind of questions and but it's most importantly it's all about going back to what I said about, you

know, getting referrals and and building relationships. It's it's it's really important. You know, referrals like I said get you interviews. Um but at some point you would you know you'll just have to apply and submit your application you know cuz you don't want you don't want to wait too long, right? But that also doesn't mean you shouldn't follow up continue to follow up with the recruiters. Continue following up with your friends at the studios because referrals can still happen even after you submitted if you feel that you know it's been too if you you waited too long to submit because there is you know sometimes a short window with job with job openings. Right. Um yeah, my you might be surprised how many people you know at the studio. All right. So okay then I would like to move on to the next question. And that would be what is the one piece of practice advice you would give someone who really really wants to join the games industry? Um

and yeah Carlos you are a person with a plan, right? So you moved around a lot and would you recommend the same path to others? I don't know if I would recommend it. That's why it took a moment. The reason why it's because it's complicated. You have to deal with it if you move different countries you have to deal with immigration, different culture. Even if you move I don't know from the United States to England it it is a completely different ball game because it's different culture. So I don't know if it is easy and then if you have the language then you have a completely different ball game there as well. So what I would say is that if you're curious and you want to deal with that and have a good challenge and know more about the world and different people I would definitely recommend it. That's how I got to meet several people

on this panel which I'm super happy. The thing I would say is that the piece of advice and it's a little bit unprofessional this piece of advice is that look at the if you're planning to do this look at the videos things you should do in blank or things that you shouldn't do in blank. So blank being the country that you're moving. Because those videos tend to be very informational and also do your own research. That is the most important thing. Right because there are a lot of opportunities where you have to move to another country. Um And there is a lot of opportunities to mess things up and offend people and you don't you want to be you want to be honest and straightforward about about things. You're always let yourself mess mess some of the stuff up but also learn from your mistake grow and ask for an apology if you feel like you mistreated someone or you offended someone by mistake.

So um Dana what is something that um artists who want to break into the industry should be doing regularly? So something that should you you should be doing and I have to admit I'm really bad at this myself uh but most of you are not. You're expert at Instagram and Twitter. Um and you should really use this to your advantage. Like really do that cuz um it's not only what Sophie said earlier a great opportunity to connect with people around the world but it's also an opportunity where you cheer each other on and allow yourself to receive feedback and um what is really cool about that is that you as an artist have the opportunity to um with with these networks go a little bit

out of your comfort zone. So I really uh advise you to do that cuz um what do I mean with that, right? I mean share your work in progress work. It is a really interesting to see you progress and how you go from from A to to this artist you are right now. Um and maybe you even share some of your interests like what Tatiana said before different interests like if you play basketball it really shows some people you are a great team player here cuz you know how to to coordinate within a team to make this goal in the end. So yeah really go on to Twitter share your work in progress work and the the most amazing thing that you might not expect is on this journey that you are sharing with your work in progress you might even inspire other artists on the way.

Yeah that really sounds inspiring, right? So um get yourself out of there. Show your work especially send it out there show your interest show who you are don't be afraid. Uh definitely inspiring. Yeah but sometimes unfortunately our industry is not perfect. Yeah right? So Sophie sometimes it cannot be the best place ever. What is what precautions can you take to make sure you don't land in a bad company? How do you find red flags? Yeah so something to keep in mind especially when you're first starting to look for work and just in your job hunt in general. Um especially if you're looking at companies that like you are so in love with and they're your dream place to work. When you're this is such a silly saying but when you're looking at the world through rose-tinted glasses red flags just look like flags. So doing your own work like we've talked

about so much in this panel already is doing your research. Uh take it upon yourself to look for news articles that might shed a bad light on the place that you're dying to work at. Um Kotaku and Polygon have done really incredible expositions on some pretty big name places and the behavior that has gone on within those companies that is pretty less than savory. Um and there is a lot of issues that run rampant within the games industry and I know this is like a very hard topic to have to bring up but it's something that because we're not talking about it enough people aren't really being held accountable and it continues to grow and it continues to happen. And with especially these you know new people coming into the industry you can help change that by knowing that these are things that are going on. Um and making it so that you don't continue that behavior or you're more willing to

call out that behavior. Uh so be prepared to you know maybe have your heart broken a little bit. Because as hard as it may be that you find out that this place that you so badly want to work for may not be the right place for you. And kind of tying it back to what I was talking about with you know joining these Discord spaces those are really great for seeing these discussions happen because sometimes there may not be a large article that's written about it. And the only way that you find out about some of the behavior from individuals at a company is from people in a Discord group or a thread on Twitter. But also you have to know to not take those with you know at face value. You still have to look into it and you know find out if you can validate the information that you're seeing. So you know look for those red flags because there's some really terrible stuff that happens within the industry from the people that you would call your co-workers. And uh you know yeah. You mentioned a few great

resources like Polygon and Kotaku, right? Mhm. Yeah thank you for that. Yeah. All right. This definitely something that needs to be kept in mind. Uh yeah but let's move on to the next question. And that would be how do how did you remain resilient during your job search? So on this picture here we have Dana uh in during her difficult times in her life. But hey this is you but you got back up again, right? So how did you get into that situation and how did you get back up? Yeah you you can see me there uh looking for a job. Uh kind of overworking myself and just being crushed for a moment and I just really had to rest. Uh but how did I get there? So in 2016 I was still at Buga which was for me one of the most amazing companies that I stumbled upon and I was

lucky to be part of. Um and in that year our company so Buga had a really rough time. Um and so it came that one day we were all called into a big auditorium um by surprise and we got the information that 20% of our people had to be laid off. And I was part of one of them even though I worked um for quite some time there and this a really has grown to be a family. Yeah, I this was really a real shocking moment for me. This was just my second home, you could say. So, yeah. Luckily for me, just before that happened, I was already planning to have something like

sabbatical where I really wanted to expand my skills. I wanted to try something new and with that in my head, I was really lucky to already have a plan planted in into my head that I really wanted to succeed. The only thing that was missing was the the new goal. Why was I doing this? I was not doing this for my old company, right? But what would would be the the new company be like? So, one thing that I really wanted to try out was how would it be to become a 3D environment artist. So, I was starting to look into what does this actually mean to be a 3D environment artist? What does it mean for job wise? So, I was looking into job AdWords. What would a certain companies need to see in a person who has this this this expertise. And so, I was

was sitting down looking at new um new software that I could learn. I trained a few more skills. Then after a year, this was my time frame. I really wanted to go deep into into the job hunt. So, I did that and I did not get a job in the game industry. I however got a job very close to that in in media. And um with that, I got to learn something new. I got to learn how to work with VR and with with art installations. I widened my horizon in in ways I I did not imagine at this point. But unfortunately, I really noticed I noticed really quickly that this is not my home. This is not my people. So, I decided for myself, okay, I was not good enough the first time.

Let's keep trying. And so, I was working this um a 40-hour job still. And I was also throwing myself into workshops, online schooling, and whatnot. And what did that to me is what you can see here on this picture. And what I want to tell you with that is this is not the way to go. You should really rest up at some point and really grant yourself um the time you need to to be yourself, be a person. Um yeah, after that I did take some time. I actually took a whole month off and did my favorite thing. I went to events again on a beautiful location. I had some rest and shortly after that, that was now 2 years after I was laid off, all of the sudden there are three job offers waiting for me.

And I was wondering, where have they been all those times? I was looking for for almost 2 years now and nothing happened. Um but something, and this is the second lesson I have to tell you, is that um it is not always on you who has to work hard to get the job. Sometimes it's also the industry that happens to not look for a job right now, but they sometimes happen to look for you and then suddenly everybody at the same time. So, um don't be hard on yourself. Um take the time you need to to rest and yeah, sometimes it's just unfortunately a waiting game. Yeah, but you did it and that's the most important thing. Uh yeah. Work hard, but also take your time to rest, right? So, Jeremy, something similar actually happened to you, right? So, you worked at Telltale Games when the studio closed

down. How did you stay resilient during these difficult times? Uh yeah, it was a tough time, a very similar experience. You know, it was heartbreaking. You know, we were one big huge family at Telltale. It felt like you know, I was being separated from my brothers and sisters, but uh you know, it was kind of just that that helped me remain resilient. You know, we my Telltale family, we all banded together, we all helped each other. Uh the the industry at large, once news broke out, really reached out and and helped support um all that networking I had done, you know, at GDC, being a conference associate, and all the interview the networking I had done at other events prior to that really paid off. I had people reaching out to me, you know, that were worried. Um but even though I still had all that, I still it still was a huge journey getting back into the industry. I was still unemployed for 2 months. Um I was online every day looking and applying and networking with referrals. Um but then again, somebody I knew at Telltale introduced me to somebody at

Warner Brothers and that's how I got the contract at Warner Brothers. Um but then Cryptic reached out to me from a recruiter that I actually knew years prior through Magic Leap. Um so, you never know what could happen. You could be talking to somebody today that might be interviewing you 5 years from now. Um so, just remaining, you know, above all, remain humble, remain positive and optimistic. Um and you know, just keep building on those relationships. Yeah, thank you for your advice. Just all these things so humble, but you're actually amazing. Um Yeah. Um Carlos, what is your plan so that you don't end up like this photo while looking for a new job in the games industry? So, it's hard because I'm usually interviewing all the time and being interviewed interviewing and being interviewed all the time. So, uh what I would say is don't try to compete with other people. That's uh that never worked out for me and I

if it worked out for you, I good luck with that. The reason why I say this is because one time I was interviewing for a position and basically, I I wasn't chosen for that position and later later I learned that I was the second option and the first option I uh some people handed me the CV. I managed to get the CV of the guy who actually got that position and really when I compared myself to that guy, he was a much better fit for that position. And so, the reason why I say this is like if I were to be honest, he was definitely much more experienced. He fitted the the job right right away and multiple times it's not it's not the it's not that you weren't good enough. It's because someone was better and what you have to do is not to compare yourself with other people. It's compare yourself to who you've been yesterday.

So, if you really wanted if I really wanted a job, I should have trained on those specific tools for those specific things for that specific company and I didn't have that skill set. So, I was kind of in the wrong position at the time. So, do always try to be better. All that everybody has a different story and sometimes you can try super hard and not get the results that you expected and it's all right. You I'm not saying shrug it off. Learn, learn, evolve, and continue moving forward. It's just a misstep. You can you will take many of those and I messed up multiple times in my life and I want people to know that. And it's not the it's not the reason to stop. It's um one more reason to continue going and learn from your mistakes and continue

moving forward. So, yeah. Absolutely. Yeah, thank you for that, Carlos. That was actually really inspiring. Don't stop. Continue, but also take care of yourself and your time will come definitely. Yeah, and do some exercise. It also helps. If you had a bad day, just run as fast as you can. Probably it will go away. All right. I agree. Right, and this is it. As you can see, our panelists went through many trials and still they stayed stayed resilient and I hope that you could learn a lot of them and get inspired by them. So, let's summarize a little bit. Update your LinkedIn profile. Be open for new experiences. Stay up-to-date with your industry friends. And be yourself. Stay strong and exercise, right? So, yeah. This was it. I hope you have you have an amazing rest of GDC and this was

our panel. And I hope that we can see you at the next GDC in person. So, all right. Thank you and bye. Bye, everybody. Thanks for watching. Thanks for watching. Thank you. Thanks. Thanks. Ooh, amazing.