Reflection and Key Takeaways

After having all our guest speakers give their presentations, here are some bullet points of the key takeaways from each speaker and actions that I have taken for my own practice.

Jamie Blacknell: https://sites.wsagames.com/is3g23/jamie-blacknell

• Significance of soft skills..
• Dedication.
• Willingness to take risks.
• Strong communication.

Olivia Gregory: https://sites.wsagames.com/is3g23/olivia-gregory-guest-speaker

• Actively network.
• Refine my portfolio.

Bea Grove: https://sites.wsagames.com/is3g23/bea-grove-guest-speaker

• Showcase the three years of experience we already have.
• Highlighting our responsibilities, contributions, and areas of ownership within projects.
• Remember about small studios, not just the AAA companies.

Rhys Shephard: https://sites.wsagames.com/is3g23/rhys-shepherd-guest-speaker

• Put yourself out there.
• Make connections whenever you can.
• The worst outcome is simply a rejection or no response.

Megan Matthews: https://sites.wsagames.com/is3g23/megen-guest-speaker/

• “Treat your portfolio like you’re building a level.”
• Tailor your portfolio.
• Researching the types of games they create and rearranging your featured projects to highlight any similar work.
• Be clear, concise, and professional

Jade Carter: https://sites.wsagames.com/is3g23/jade-carter-guest-speaker

• It’s ok to be uncertain about your career path
• Communicate with the people around you
• Be accountable
• Adaptation is key

━━━∙⋆⋅⋆∙━━━━━━━━━━∙⋆⋅⋆∙━━━━━━━━━━∙⋆⋅⋆∙━━━━━━━━━━∙⋆⋅⋆∙━━━

Actions I’ve taken with my own practice

I’ve been to the careers team to talk about my future, and within this, I am currently in the process of reaching out to someone within the games industry in hopes of gaining some useful tips when potentially applying for their company.

In the process of making and printing off some business cards in preparation for semester 2, when we go to events.

Started connecting with more people on LinkedIn to get myself out there, also going to start posting more in the second semester as a way of documenting our game progress / promoting

Over Christmas, I’m going to revisit my portfolio and start refining it while also considering Megan’s questions.