As a studio ever since we were founded and setup, we dared to be different. We told ourselves that we need not be yet another developer. We wanted to be naturally radical with our approach and way of working. One of those tricky parts of running a creative business like Games is that it is very hard to create a corporate structure especially when you are starting up. This should not be confused with defining roles and responsibilities though, which is extremely crucial for a small team. We were always a huge fan of Valve Software whose flat org structure is highly praised in the industry. It certainly inspired us to try and adopt that model with our very own take. We wanted each of our members to have the highest level of ownership, creative liberty and accountability and that meant we couldn’t put them under layers of reporting structures.
This isn’t to dismiss the idea of reporting structures or those studios/developers who practice it, it is just that it never aligned with our school of thought. We always wanted the studio to be that place where a bunch of highly enthusiastic individuals gathering together to make some great stuff and for that to happen you have got to set that conducive atmosphere. So we decided that the idea of a flat org apply to anyone and everyone in the team, be it a senior engineer, artist or a fresh new intern - it simply doesn’t matter. We are usually asked, what about those who can abuse the system? Well, thats exactly why we talk about cultural fit- isnt it? We cannot fool ourselves by stating that we built this fool proof culture within the studio, No! We have had several instances where we found some of them couldn’t adapt to such a work process where they dont have a direct reporting manager and that they need to identify and sign their tasks on their own. Some of them did eventually fall out of the system. Perhaps they were a better fit in a fully structured setup.
In all honesty, for any business, let alone Gaming, this is a super risky setup. It can easily end up in a state of anarchy. But this is also where there needs to be checks and balances. A culture of a team or a company isn’t something that is etched on a stone day one and assumed its going to run forever. Its a continuous process that evolves overtime needing its own maturity over a period. In our case, we can probably say that it easily took us 4-5 years to reach that point where things to a large extent run on their own, people have their regime and know what they need to do. After all the failures that we encountered in the past helped us strengthen the system. The result of this system is that we are always able to get things done at break neck speeds. No time wasted in long winding discussions, meetings or approvals. When the team hears from a certain client or a platform partner about a certain idea or a game that needs to be done, it simply gets done. The concerned developer or the designer would act as a Product Manager, interact with the customer and ensure the final product is delivered. It doesn’t also matter where the works get done from at times, be it from home or at the studio. Our team members generally have the liberty to plug into work while being remote and they dont do it out of compulsion but out of sheer ownership they exhibit. This makes us very agile and some of clients come to appreciate us for this. There is a great deal of team work seen on the floor and that’s exactly what growing team need. It beats us at times to see small teams slowed down by layers of middle and upper management. This isn’t to say we aren’t process driven. In fact in recent times, we have spent so much energy to defining a lot of our in-house process and still continue to refine them. We are after a growing studio!