LadleTaps

At one point in my career, I was asked if I had any suggestions on how to be a lead or audio director by adhering to philosophical ideals or mindsets. At the time, I had no answer I was willing to propose as a heuristic for effective leadership. Now that I've completed my work on Baldur's Gate 3 and advanced further in my career, I find myself revisiting this question. As someone who both studies and teaches ethical and moral philosophies, I should surely have some insights, both from my own experiences and from history. So, I shall attempt to address this query with some points that have recently become important to me. A Good Leader is Impervious to Corruption Corruption manifests in various forms, but the most insidious is financial. Leaders often succumb to the allure of monetary gain, jeopardizing the well-being of those they are meant to guide. I have worked under leads who were so preoccupied with their earnings that they deflected blame onto others to avoid criticism. I

Having worked in the industry for a long time, I have seen both great and terrible audio leads, supervisors, and directors. People who will either encourage, destroy or do something in-between with those they profess to care for. Sadly, I was part of the column that said, "terrible." When I started at a game company some years ago, they decided to ask me if I could be their audio director. They presented the money I would make, which was half the reason I accepted it, and they spoke using 5-dollar words about my importance in that position. That was the other half of why I accepted it. Those two things became so ingrained into my daily routine that when sound designers presented me with WIP, I did not apply the suitable "game" to the process and instead went hunting for what was wrong. I heard rumors of private channels being made on Slack to vent about me, but I thought little of it. I mean, I made more money than them, and someone had described to me before I acce

When it comes down to hiring in the audio industry, there are probably a dozen or more articles that meander about what you need to be hired. As someone who worked in the audio industry, from the movie business to video games, I thought I would put my own two cents in that slot, especially in the video game industry machine—both from the side that was hired and did the hiring. I hope something new can be gleaned from my ramblings rather than just adding to the white noise. I should add that these are my own opinions and don't represent the industry as a whole; you'll find some game studios tackling this differently. However, these are things I've noticed in the 10+ years to be the most common and what I personally look for and expect.  Junior Sound Designers:  Sound reel: 30 seconds to 1 minute long; Can be sound redesigns of other games (gameplay is a bonus); Can be a scene from a student film; Start with your best work; No music; No long introductions or logos. I don'