IGDA Elections – Chuck Hoover
February 15th, 2010 by Macguffin in UncategorizedIf you’re coming to this post without having seen the lead-in, you can find that post here. It links to all the other assessments I’ve posted. You can also find my disclaimer there – I’m on the Boston IGDA chapter’s board and support the candidacy of Darius Kazemi.
UPDATE – Mr. Hoover stopped by and answered the questions below.
Mr. Hoover’s statement has some generalities to it, but also some intriguing specifics. His goal, he states, is to help make the IGDA something we can all be proud of. He puts forth three ways he wants to do that:
- Developer credits should be tied to our IGDA accounts to make them a more persistent and important part of our careers.
- Creating more knowledge sharing events, following the example of the IGDA Leadership Forum.
- The IGDA could issue ‘IGDA Approved’ certifications to studios that meet its quality of life standards.
In the Q&A, when asked the biggest problem facing devs he responds with a range of items (“lack of stability at major studios, quality of life concerns, digital piracy, and the rapidly changing economic landscape”). He then says the IGDA needs to continue with “meaningful support of its members and local chapters”. Good sentiments, but again, lacking specifics.
No firm commitment on time, but what comes across as a credible (to me) assertation that he’ll do what needs doing.
Questions for Mr. Hoover:
Why run now?
From the moment I joined this industry, I was excited about the possibilities of all that the IGDA could offer. I came to realize that the gap between what I thought a professional organization could be, and where we were as the IGDA, was pretty large.
At this point in my career, I feel like I have the drive, desire, and time to join the board and help improve the IGDA.
How would tying developer credits to IGDA accounts be better than, say, making sure your MobyGames entry is up to date?
One of my stated goals is to make the IGDA an organization we are all proud of. That goal can be attacked from multiple angles. First, is to increase the relevance of the IGDA’s initiatives, from studio sponsorship to actually supporting local chapters and their events. We have national events, such as the global game jam, but it’s ultimately an event that has a very loose structure for its participants. We are an organization chock-full of game designers; shouldn’t we do a better job of designing our game jams to include more of a reward structure for the extraordinary games that come out of them?
The second angle is to make the IGDA membership more attractive to developers and students. Many of us pay our forty eight dollars every year, but how often do we utilize the IGDA to maximize that payment we made? Making the website a place where people want to spend time is an example of this, as is tying our developer credits to our IGDA accounts makes our membership intrinsically more meaningful.
Can you give us more details on your proposal on other knowledge-sharing events like the Leadership forum? What subjects would you want to do? Would these be local or national events (I’m calling the Leadership forum national for this purpose)?
As game developers, we have a plethora of conferences every year (many more than most industries) and because of this, it’s difficult to create a conference that speaks to a new audience. However, I do think there is space for more knowledge sharing events like the IGDA Leadership Forum, one of the most successful IGDA events.
I feel there are three major aspects of this event that can be further explored in other forums:
- Focus. The Leadership forum is an extremely focused conference. It’s clear who the target audience is and it’s not trying to be all things to all people.
- Global attendees. It’s more than a local or national event, it’s global. This means that it can attract developers with a wide range of backgrounds for a more diverse experience. Knowledge is typically shared amongst studios on a regional level, but when you can gain perspectives from developers around the world, these events can reach a new plateau.
- Cross Discipline. The leadership forum focuses on developers of all disciplines who are interested in leadership, how to become better at it, and to learn from those who are already leaders. These broader topics create opportunities for meaningful dialogue between all the difference’s disciplines that we work with on a daily basis.
Why not take the trail blazed by the Leadership Forum and create our conferences not based around the job titles we hold, but rather the challenges we face as an industry.
My limited understanding of the Quality of Life SIG’s work is that they have already been working on a proposal for IGDA certification on QoL. What is your understanding of their work on this, and what issues need to be resolved to make it happen?
That is my understanding as well and I think it’s an excellent proposal. This is a perfect example of how the IGDA can be more integrated into the industry. From my background in Architecture, I’ve witnessed the proliferation of The Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Green Building Rating System. This certification took that industry by storm, because it seized onto something people cared about and defined metrics for it that were quantifiable.
We know that we as developers are just as passionate about our work life balance as we are about making games. What we need to do now, is make sure that the metrics this system is based on are measurable, that the certification carries real weight, and that we get this correct right out of the gate… all in the aim of making an “IGDA certified studio” something meaningful.
What do you think the IGDA’s role in the industry-wide Quality of Life discussions should be?
It’s clear that the IGDA is poised to take the leadership position on these discussions. We have taken strides towards this, but until something like the certification process is put into play, and I’m concerned that the IGDA’s role will become limited to discussions and white papers. The IGDA studio certification would be a great start and in my opinion should become the core of the quality of life initiative.
Do you think the IGDA’s dependence on studio sponsorships for money is a bad thing? If yes, what will you do to begin changing this? If no, why not?
I absolutely don’t think the IGDA’s dependency on studio sponsorship for funding is a negative; I actually feel the opposite is true. Both studios and we developers have a responsibility to our industry to keep the IGDA alive and well. What I do see as a negative however, is the lack of reciprocation from the IGDA back to the studios.
Just as many of us still feel like we need clearer value for our membership, studios deserve that same value for their sponsorship. If we can add a value proposition to studios sponsorship, we can increases the IGDA’s visibly; we can in turn use that visibility to increases membership.
After all, this has been done before. The USGBC’s membership increased 4 fold in the first 2 years after the inception of their LEED certification. If we can emulate their strategy and capture even a part of that success, then I see no reasons to transition away from sponsorships. People will pay for the IGDA and we will be able to find funding. The part we need to worry about, is making sure our organization is worth it, and is something we can be proud of.
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