Building Better Games
Leadership in game dev is hard. I can't make it easy, but I can make it a heck of a lot better.
My name is Benjamin Carcich, and this podcast helps leaders in game dev who feel stuck, ignored, and out of options find their path to success.
I've spent the last several decades studying and leading in environments ranging from the U.S. Army through to game development. I want to share what I've learned.
Better leadership is a huge opportunity in the games industry. Let's make it better together. Better leaders build better games.
- Update frequency
- every 13 days
- Average duration
- 54 minutes
- Episodes
- 117
- Years Active
- 2021 - 2025
S1 EP16 Real Product Management: Hard-Won Lessons Creating Amazing Products With Darko Vukovic
"Product Management" is everywhere in technology. Wherever you're working there is a need to understand what we're trying to do and where we're trying to go. The role is ubiquitous, it is crucial, an…
01:21:17 |
Tue 30 Nov 2021
S1 EP15 Accountability: Why It's Hard And How To Do It
We often hear leaders lament a lack of 'accountability' around organizations. It's commonly discussed, usually when something has gone wrong. But what is accountability? Why is it not present when pe…
01:27:08 |
Wed 17 Nov 2021
S1 EP14 Adventures in AAA Game Design with Andrew Brownell
For this episode we got to sit down with an old friend - Andrew Brownell. He's spent years as a designer and product lead in AAA studios like Riot, Red 5, and Boundless. Included are crucial lessons …
01:06:57 |
Thu 04 Nov 2021
S1 EP13 Feedback: Do you really care about the people around you?
Feedback: People don't even know what we mean when we use the term. We're talking direct, constructive, and growth-oriented - focused on the person and how they behave. We tend to focus on the work …
01:11:11 |
Tue 19 Oct 2021
S1 EP12 Scaling Yourself As A Leader: What they didn't teach you.
In this podcast we discuss and breakdown the major changes that occur as you grow into higher levels of leadership, and how our industry hasn't trained us to be effective when we get into them. Here …
01:00:31 |
Thu 07 Oct 2021
S1 EP11 Joining a Team Part 2: Disasters, challenges, and (eventual) successes
In Part 1, we talked about the framework and approach we'd recommend for a leader joining a new team. In Part 2 (this episode), we cover what bad looks like, some of the challenges you can encounter…
00:57:33 |
Tue 21 Sep 2021
S1 EP10 Joining a Team: Lead with curiosity to avoid some common traps
As leaders, we are occasionally asked to join new teams. It could be part of a promotion or expansion of responsibility, it could be that they need help and you've 'finally' arrived to provide it. Wh…
01:06:05 |
Thu 09 Sep 2021
S1 EP9 You Can't Firefight Your Way to Success
So many organizations are constantly focused on solving problems and firefighting. In this reactive position we lose a level of deliberateness: Are we actually moving toward our vision? There will …
00:54:47 |
Mon 23 Aug 2021
S1 EP8 Ahmed Sidky: Agility and driving past your faster horse
For this episode we've brought on one of our esteemed mentors lovingly referred to as "Dr Agile" ( his super-duper favorite nickname). Ahmed is a legend in the software development and Agile space, b…
00:51:35 |
Wed 28 Apr 2021
S1 EP7 Incentives: The crucial part of culture you’re not considering - Part 2
Continuing our talk on Incentives, we dive into some examples and pragmatic ideas that can help you take advantage of the behaviors you encourage and discourage in your team or organization. Ask us q…
01:09:59 |
Wed 17 Mar 2021
S1 EP6 Incentives: The crucial part of culture you’re not considering - Part 1
Leadership. That always present topic that helps us realize that just talking about something doesn’t make it any better. We take a look at what is so often missed when we think about any leader’s ro…
00:51:57 |
Tue 16 Mar 2021
S1 EP5 Death Spiral: Planning the meeting to prep for the discussion at the leadership off-site about why our team's productivity is low.
Why, oh why are there so many meetings all the time. Meetings. MEETINGS. It’s all we do anymore. With remote work it’s even worse. It’s mind-numbing. We hate it. Why do we keep doing it to ourselves?…
01:35:48 |
Tue 16 Mar 2021
S1 EP4 Operations Dudes Try Product Management
The first podcast we ever recorded. Starts slow, but gets rolling about halfway through. We’ve always loved product management. And we’ve always known it was hard. Now you get to watch us fumble, gro…
01:18:18 |
Tue 16 Mar 2021
S1 EP3 Stop Doing and Start Being
We're missing something in our approach when it comes to Agility and process. "I'm executing the steps right and it just isn't working." We hear a lot of talk about the difference between "being" an…
01:29:20 |
Tue 16 Mar 2021
S1 EP2 Explaining the Inexplicable Boss
What’s at the bottom of why we do the things we do? Sure, there’s mastery, autonomy, and purpose, but let’s take a deeper look at what so many are trying to solve for. Go far enough, and you can ofte…
01:20:20 |
Tue 16 Mar 2021
S1 EP1 He did it all for the Nook-E-Reader
Aaron takes us on his journey through a year spent at Barnes & Noble, walking through the differences in culture, some system shocks, and the Riot hangover. Ask us questions, give us a piece of you…
01:00:40 |
Tue 16 Mar 2021
EP0 Game dev: Why we're here and what we believe
Why are we doing this? What's the point of it all? Start here as we dig into the "why" behind Building Better Games. Spoiler: Great games come from great leaders.
00:04:41 |
Mon 15 Mar 2021
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are the property of Benjamin Carcich. This content is not affiliated with or endorsed by eachpod.com.