Learn from Leaders Podcast

In this episode, Johannes shares his path from banking enterprise coaching and what it taught him about leading teams, driving innovation, and navigating enterprise transformation. From embracing design thinking to leveraging AI for productivity, Johannes dives into the evolving world of Enterprise Management, busts industry myths, and explains how small teams can outperform massive projects. (00:...

In this episode, John Rossman dives into the core principles of his book, Big Bet Leadership, sharing how senior leaders can create clarity, maintain velocity, and accelerate risk and value to drive real impact. Drawing from his time at Amazon and other major companies, John unpacks how dedicated teams, strong leadership, and effective communication separate industry leaders from the rest. (00:00)...

In this episode Jon Leslie breaks down the key career moves that shaped his approach to product development—from enterprise software to game dev, then from games to the vendor side. Jon breaks down the product operating model, highlighting how strategy, discovery, and delivery come together to build successful, customer-focused products. (00:00) | Intro (00:45) | Career Crossroads: From Enterprise...

In this episode of Learn from Leaders, Patric and Adam break down key trends in the gaming industry, from entrepreneurship and leadership to talent acquisition and AI's growing role in development. They discuss the balance between specialization and versatility, the impact of industry crises, and the future of transmedia storytelling. The conversation also covers investment trends, hybrid work cha...

In this episode of Learn from Leaders, Patric Palm & Benjamin Carcich discuss the concept of leadership balance, focusing on the distinction between "Founder Mode" and "Manager Mode." They dive into the misconceptions surrounding these modes, often oversimplified as micromanagement versus hands-off leadership. Using examples from companies like Larian Studios (Baldur's Gate 3), they emphasize...

In this episode of the Learn from Leaders podcast, Patric Palm and Benjamin Carcich discuss practical models for fostering accountability, balancing individual roles with team objectives, and how positive consequences can break fear-based cycles. (00:00) | Intro (00:45) | The Importance of Accountability The episode begins with a discussion on why accountability is crucial for both individuals and...

In this episode, Patric Palm and his guest discuss the misapplication and challenges of implementing Agile practices in the game development industry. They also touch on how modern techniques like measuring throughput instead of granular estimates can improve production efficiency and outcomes. (00:00) | Intro (00:44) | State of Agile development in the games industry Benjamin explains why Agile i...

In this episode, of the Learn from Leaders podcast, Patric Palm & Benjamin Carcich delve into the challenges and evolution of the gaming industry, with a focus on the shift towards live service games. The discussion covers how player expectations are driving developers to adopt continuous updates, which has transformed both game development and business strategies. (00:00) | Intro (00:44) | Li...

In this episode, the Patric Palm & Benjamin Carcich dive into the challenges of game production, discussing leadership struggles, inefficiencies, and the need for better management practices that balance creativity with process. (00:00) | Intro (00:44) | Challenges within Games Production Today The conversation moves to the broader challenges in game production, including leadership struggles,...

In this episode, Patric and Benjamin discuss the key challenges and lessons in game development leadership, focusing on the role of producers in driving both creativity and efficiency. The conversation covers: (00:00) | Intro (00:00) | Being Thrown Through the Wall of Your Own Naiveté Benjamin reflects on a pivotal moment in his career where political realities in a company led to his departure. T...

Mark explores the challenges of leading and recruiting for distributed teams in the gaming industry. He discusses the difficulty of assessing cultural fit through remote interviews, the need for self-driven team members, and the impact of remote work on leadership. Mark also addresses broader industry issues like rising development costs, market saturation, and the evolving role of AI in game deve...

John unpacks the intricacies of managing and collaborating in a remote-first work environment. He shares tips on fostering trust, establishing clear expectations, and maintaining open communication as crucial elements for success. John also explores collaborating with external partners in game development, highlighting how to achieve upfront alignment and establish clear communication channels. Gu...

Could Carl's approach to game design, emphasizing responsive AI and emergent technologies, be key to replicating the success of Helldivers 2? Carl delves into the success factors behind Helldivers 2, dissecting its core appeal. He emphasizes the game's satisfying co-op gameplay and its tongue-in-cheek, satirical world that fosters a strong sense of community. Carl highlights how the game's design...

What are the insights regarding the game industry's talent cycles, remote work challenges, and the impact of layoffs on studios? Jenny discusses historical trends in talent acquisition, the challenges larger studios face in embracing external talent, and the impact of COVID-19 on remote work acceptance. During the talk, our guest covered how Game Boost faces remote contractors and the increasing t...

Past, present, and future: what are the significant changes in marketing strategies in the gaming industry? Matthew talks about the transformative journey of games marketing, a decade's shift from skepticism toward influencer culture to fostering authentic collaborations. The conversation delves into the widening divide between indie and AAA games due to faster marketing cycles, balancing creativi...

Why does the games industry still have big issues in production management and what can be done about it? Ben and Aaron discuss typical issues related to how game companies are managed today, specifically leadership in production. They advocate for how a paradigm shift in leadership can help studios bring better games faster to the market at a lower cost. Listen to learn more about how to embrace...

Guests: Josiah Kiehl, with a background in software engineering, started his career at Oracle, focusing on business software, before transitioning to Riot Games. There, he played a crucial role in scaling the delivery of the viral game League of Legends to a global audience, working extensively on automation and infrastructure software. After a successful stint at Riot, Josiah briefly worked at Go...

Guest: Carl is a Leadership/Agile Development Expert, having decades of hands-on experience as an entrepreneur, manager & leaders across a diverse range of industries. He is also as one of the global SAFe Fellows an official contributor to the SAFe Framework and one of the key people behind the Release Train Engineer (RTE) certification course.litator. The founder of leadership & agile adv...

Guest: Jon Lawrence has been in the games industry since 1998 after joining Bullfrog Productions. A career in games for 25 years spent at Electronic Arts, Microsoft, Natural Motion, Digit Games studios, and now at Tencent games. Have managed a mixture of internal and external projects on PC, Console, and mobile and worked on many successful titles, including Harry Potter, Formula 1, Need For Speed...

Guest: Alan McDairmant is Head of Studio Operations at Fuse Games, a former member of the Criterion studio leadership team, worked for EA for over 17 years as a leader on the Need For Speed games. He moved into leadership project management roles quickly and has always embraced a collaborative, servant leadership approach to working with teams to help enable people and projects achieve their goals...

Guest: Carl is a battle-scarred entrepreneur and investor who has seen many sides of the tech ecosystem. He runs Creandum’s San Francisco office and invests across consumer internet, and b2b software. Carl started his career in management consulting and went on to co-found the digital ad network AdProfit, bootstrapping the business into one of the leading digital channels for b2b advertising in th...

Guest: Teis Mikkelsen is the CEO and Co-founder of Multiscription. He has a passion for the mobile games industry, and it shines through his 15 years of experience managing games and digital product development. Teis and his co-founder Martin got the idea for Multiscription from experiencing both sides of the subscription model: the problem and the solution side. They started the company in Decemb...

What will the future of management in the games industry look like? What is changing, and how it affects culture and management? Tune in to hear the thoughts of two inspiring industry leaders. Guest: For the past 18 years, Zoë Curnoe has held production positions at a range of companies that include working with artists in the Canadian Rocky Mountains at the Banff Centre, as well as working with s...

What will the future of management in the games industry look like? What is changing, and how it affects culture and management? Tune in to hear the thoughts of two inspiring industry leaders. Guest: For the past 18 years, Zoë Curnoe has held production positions at a range of companies that include working with artists in the Canadian Rocky Mountains at the Banff Centre, as well as working with s...

For Antti Sartanen, CEO of Return Entertainment, part of the charm is solving problems nobody has touched before. With that mindset, he’s stepping out to the gaming frontier and aims to make cloud-native gaming accessible. In this episode, Patric and Antti discussed the differences between cloud gaming and cloud-native gaming, the prospects of the latter, as well as democratizing gaming and handli...