The Business of Esports: Recruitment and Market Growth in the Gaming Industry

Tom Leonard 

I'm Tom Leonard, I'm the host of the Gamers Change Lives podcast, where we talk about how e-sports can create jobs anywhere in the world. Play games, create jobs, change lives. The first season, we talked about jobs. In the second season, we call it follow the money. We talked about investment, we talked about sponsorship. And now in season three, then in season three, we talked about business basics. Now in season four, hard to believe we're already in season four, we've been at this a little while. So in season four, we've been talking about accelerators and incubators. With basically the idea, we want to talk about entrepreneurs, whether they're e-sports entrepreneurs or really any entrepreneur, what kind of resources are out there for people to further their program, no matter whether it's esports related or whether it's not. Today, I’m really, really glad to have Mirko Minenza. And if I mispronounce your name, you feel free to correct me. Hey there, Mirko.

Mirko 

Hey there, how are you doing? Thanks for having me. It was a pleasure. I know the name was spelled amazingly actually. Looks like the Italian way. Perfect.

Tom Leonard 

Si, si. So, Mirko is the business strategy manager at Intel and has other experiences, including playing Overwatch. So, say Italiano.

Tom Leonard 

So, where are you speaking to us now?

Mirko 

Yeah, sono italiano, precisely. Yeah, coming from Rome originally.

Mirko 

So right now I'm based in Prague, and have been living here for like two years and a half already. Wow, time flies. And yeah, originally coming from Rome when I spent 25 years of my life and then I decided to move and to go for a new experience. And really so far so good. Prague is a lovable city, I would say.

Tom Leonard 

So what made you move and what made you pick Prague?

Mirko 

All right, this happened a little bit like, you know, I will say it wasn't planned because just after I got my master's degree, you know, I really wanted to be a gaming recruiter and you're gonna probably ask yourself why do you want to be a gaming recruiter? Very simple, like I wanted to try to go for a job which basically has an impact on, a positive impact on people's lives, you know, like as a medic, but of course I wasn't going for it. So I thought in a very childish way that as a recruiter, you can basically help improve people's professional life and live some kind of positive influence on society. So it was a job that always made me think and made me be some kind of inspired in order to do so. And so I thought, yeah, this could be really interesting. And the gaming world, just because I'm a massive nerd, so it came pretty naturally to try to chase this industry. So basically, right after university, I was looking for an opportunity to at first become a recruiter and then eventually in the gaming world. And yeah, basically applied all over Italy, but eventually in Europe, you know, like no geographical boundaries. And the first call came from Prague. So that's why basically I never even liked visiting Prague before coming here for the first time. So it was really a yolo decision, but no regrets. It was super cool.

Tom Leonard 

Yes, yes, because if you are Italian, you can travel and work anywhere in the EU, right?

Mirko 

Precisely, yes. This is a big, big massive block that all the European citizens have. So we have no boundaries, like no problems or any kind of limitations in this regard, which is super cool. So yeah. Yeah, I would say yes.

Tom Leonard 

I make a huge difference. Yeah, it would open up so many opportunities that I mean, because especially if you're specializing in gaming, maybe gaming isn't as big in Italy as it might be in Sweden or some other country. And so it's easy to move around, easier than in some places. That's one of the benefits that we get living in the United States. There's so many different parts of the United States. It's almost like you're Europe, except we all speak the same language. But it's like, you know, for California, it's completely different than up north, you know, in Seattle versus in the Midwest versus the East Coast versus the South. It's like completely different cultures, which gives us the opportunity to do a lot of different things. Now, when does it start? And so you said that you're a nerd and that you're a gamer. Can you talk a little bit about how you get into gaming starting out?

Mirko 

Well, this came pretty early in my life, I would say in my life, because it was like a first time love. Like my father bought me the first PlayStation when I was like, I think, five years old, something like that. I recall playing, I don't know, WWE, Pro Evolution Soccer, like 2006, I guess, these kinds of games on the PlayStation. And it was like really, I mean, like this was even PlayStation 2, I guess, like earlier, it was really Metal Gear Solid, Spyro, Crash Bandicoot, this kind of stuff. And it was pure love. So since I was really a little kid, I always played and it has always been part of my life. And this eventually passion developed up to be, you know, like a vehicle to make new friends once I started playing online games. And the first, let's say experience of bonding and you know, love and disregard came by playing Tekken Tag Team Tournament 2, which basically, since it's like a fighting game, you're of course playing online, but this gave me the opportunity when I was like, really, I was really loving the game. So I really studied how to kind of aim to be a pro, which I didn't manage because it's super hard, but still, this gave me the opportunity to join communities in Rome. So I played a lot with a lot of local people over there, and then I started to be, I wouldn't say a pro, but quite good at the game. So, you know, joining tournaments. And this is a super cool bonding experience. I made a lot of friends by that. So with the Tekken experience also, I had a lot to be a part of organizing tournaments, handling the streams, and also understanding what's behind the scenes of organizing esports events. And to be fair, it's super cool. So for a while I played, kind of trying to aim into the top, but I understood that it wasn't for me. So I just enjoyed the whole community thing behind playing Tekken. The university game was really time consuming. So I just decided to drop it for a while. And I started playing Overwatch, which again was first like site love because it started out random as a lot of things happened, you know? And it started with a friend of mine to make these new cool Blizzard games coming out. Let's give it a shot. And we just fall in love with that. And basically we played it really a lot, like really some kind of addiction and by playing, I also made new friends online and we basically created some kind of clan. And on Overwatch I was quite good at it. So I managed to be in the top 500 in the European ladder for several seasons. And so I did some tournaments, local ones, online ones. Again, an amazing experience. But again, I wasn't good enough to become like some kind of professional player and make a living out of it. So after that experience, I said, okay, maybe I cannot live by playing games, but I would like to professionally be involved in this sector. So this is how I guess my mind connected the idea of playing with working with video games, I suppose.

Tom Leonard 

It makes a lot of sense. It's easy, people are always telling you, follow your passion. And it's like, that's easy to say. It's really, really tough to do sometimes. And the other thing that we found in talking to people over the different seasons is how hard it is to be a really top professional player. I mean, it takes a lot of skill and a lot of practice. I mean, it doesn't people don't just go, I'm really good at video games, I'm gonna turn pro. It's like, it doesn't work. Our second guest on the podcast was Queen Arrow from Kenya. And she does fighting games. And she's sponsored and she's a professional player out there. And it's just like, wow. I mean, that just takes, especially female, is also another wrinkle in esports out there.

Mirko 

It doesn't work.

Tom Leonard 

So no, that's great that you were able to match them up. Let's talk a little bit about recruiting because that's your background. And I think everyone at one point or another needs a job. And so they need to figure out a way to get jobs. Can you talk a little bit about until, is that how you pronounce it? Where are you now and what is it that they do?

Mirko 

Yeah. So basically, Antal is a global recruitment firm, which basically helps companies from different kinds of industries hiring people. We provide stuff in need, such as recruitment, onboarding, payroll system, which can be contractors or permanent placement. So everything related to the HR department, we try to help companies make it better. So as a company itself, we are like, yeah, corporate offices worldwide with more than 2,500 employees. In my specific case, I work in Antal Czechia, which is the Czech Republic branch of Antal International. And we basically have, as you can imagine, several divisions, which are like pharmaceutical companies, engineering ones, like IT ones. But originally, like a friend of mine started out the gaming division basically for the passion, for the sake of like, you know, doing that in the gaming world. So we started out approximately three years ago. Right now this friend is not in the company anymore, but like, so I took over and yeah, right now we are like, we have recruitment consultants helping gaming companies, both like, we are based both in Czech and in Poland, but we're helping gaming companies mostly in Europe and in the US and yeah, it's super cool to be fair.

Tom Leonard 

So there probably aren't too many recruiters who are like, I really like accounting. I really want to be a passionate accounting recruiter but gaming is going to be a little bit different. How is gaming recruiting seen within the organization? You said there's 2,500 employees. How many people work in gaming?

Mirko 

Right now, we are just two stable one recruiters. And plus we have some other, let's say, I like recruiters specializing in the IT area, which are like, we can, they can help us on some mixed hybrid roles. So depending on the demand, like if we're managing, I don't know, 20, 25 roles at the same moment, we can, you know, eventually put some of our internal other recruiters into it. But yeah, as a stable one, we are two. Back then the business unit was bigger, not gonna lie on it, but since the whole industry's facing quite a hard time at the moment, there were some restructuring in that sense of people that had been reassigned to other business unit because right now for the, let's say, recruitment area, the gaming industry is not at its best, I would say. So that's what we decided to do in order to strive.

Tom Leonard 

What do you think that is? Why do you think gaming is having a hard time right now? And not really looking for particular company specifics out there, but just in general. Why? You have insights that not everyone has of what it's like on the recruiting, on the hiring side of things. What's happening these days?

Mirko 

Sure. Well, it's a complex phenomenon, of course, which really depends on several factors altogether. But if we want to try to generalize, I would say that the gaming industry in the last 15 years always grew on a yearly basis in terms of revenues and overall growth. And this phenomenon had a huge peak during the pandemic because it's quite easy to figure it out for the restrictions. A lot of people were forced to stay at home. And of course, the demand for video games just peaked, skyrocketing from people who never played video games and they started out during the COVID or people who were already playing. At the time, they decided to increase the time spent on video games. And so people were buying more games and gaming companies made more money, which of course led to hiring a lot of people in order to keep up with the increasing demand and having even bigger and faster growth. But when the situation stabilized after the new laws, after basically the situation got not to normality, basically all those people that were on the paychecks of the companies, you still need to pay your employees once you hire them. Their firm employees and the revenues just basically kept growing. But in some cases, they just either got back at the pandemic levels or they simply didn't keep up, you know, the new costs that came along with the new hires. So companies were now financially struggling to, you know, stay, to stay alive because of that. And this led to massive waves of layoffs, which is in my opinion, pretty much what happened with the IT industry, with the big techs, the fun, such as Google or Microsoft, in Facebook, like, OK, now it's meta. In early stages of 2022, we just had the same phenomenon, but lately, starting in the half of 2023, and unfortunately, still running right now. So this over-hiring phenomenon during the pandemic led to then

Tom Leonard 

Do you think it's gonna be worse in the future?

Mirko 

Let's say this current situation, I guess.

Tom Leonard 

Or I guess the question is, is it, it's not over yet. I mean, there's still more downsizing on the horizon, do you think?

Mirko 

Yeah, I would say that right now the situation is not getting back to normality yet, because for a couple of weeks we are still hearing about studio closures and layoffs. But to be fair, just this week finally we got some good news. We heard about two new branching studios coming from industry veterans that just started out. So this gives some positivity and some good vibes for the future. But looking at what analysts are trying to forecast for the near future looks like that the situation will, let's say, I wouldn't say let's get back to normality, but at least, you know, get better, perhaps in Q3, Q4, 2024. So it's gonna still be a tough time for a while, but hopefully by the end of the year, we should see some improvements.

Tom Leonard 

So can you describe a little bit about the difference between game development companies in Europe versus game development companies in the US? Is it much different when it comes to hiring and longevity and things like that? Or do you kind of see them as extremely similar?

Mirko 

That's a very interesting question. And I'm gonna be super transparent here. I don't think I have the necessary knowledge to do a proper comparison, because as you can imagine, I mostly focus on the European market, just because of the time zone. And it's just, I guess it's easier, right? So very recently I've been in touch and helping strong US companies. So most likely my knowledge is very limited in this regard, but from what I noticed from these previous experiences, I would say that perhaps gaming like US-based companies are, let's say more, for example, an organic recruitment process, just faster. Usually it takes less time to, you know, get interviews and to process everything. And it looks like there is just a faster market to some extent. While in Europe, we tend to be maybe a little bit more cautious in hirings. Also, because like a lot of countries have more, let's say, stronger employee labor laws. So meaning that, for example, it's, let's say harder to lay off someone in Europe, generally speaking, of course, it really depends as well on which country you're picking. But from a general perspective, it's, I would say harder to, you know, take this decision in Europe rather than in the US. So I would say that it's also a little bit more cautious planning while creating the hiring strategy. So from our, let's say, HR and recruitment perspective, perhaps this is the biggest difference that I noticed while handling these two kinds of recruitment processes in Europe and in the US. But also what I can say is that, usually gaming companies, they do it mostly for the passion of making good games, right? Of course, the financial impact is important, especially at the corporate level, but CEOs are still gamers that love to make cool games, you know, and this super cool feeling and emotion it's widespread can be in Europe, can be in the US. I believe it can even be like other countries such as China or Japan. This is what it's like bonding with the companies and also what makes it super cool to me, you know, because it's not just a matter of making money and looking at financial KPIs, but it's also a matter of trying to do something with the real passion to do it.

Tom Leonard 

What about different, you mentioned different countries within Europe? And what are the kinds of differences you see from different parts of the, because you're in Eastern Europe, which I mean, I think of it as Eastern Europe. And it seems to be a very, very strong gaming world there. I mean, with Ukraine, with Poland, and so on, but compared to some other places. What kind of differences do you find between different regions? I always think like Sweden. Sweden is way above their weight in gaming and esports compared to their size, the population and so on. Can you describe the approaches to the business in different parts of Europe?

Mirko 

Yeah, totally. I would say that there are quite big differences compared to the impact of the gaming industry on the national economy. I can mention Italy, for example, and that's also perhaps one of the reasons why I decided to leave Italy. At least at the moment because the gaming industry and the gaming scenarios, although it's luckily growing even in Italy, is not as consolidated as, for example, Poland, Sweden, the UK, or some other big names in European game development. So surely there are big differences in this regard. And I will say that Eastern Europe is one of the fastest growing areas for the game development industry. We can think about CD Projekt RED, based in Poland, Techland, I can say Bohemia Interactive, which is in Czech Republic, Amber, like there are plenty of super cool studios that they are like being created and they are in the last years, really rising and creating massive IPs that are played worldwide. So I will say that what happened in Sweden like 15 or 20 years ago with this massive growth of gaming companies, you know, which of course now they're very well established. It's pretty much happening here in Eastern Europe. And that's interesting even to me to try to understand how come this phenomenon is running here, right? I would say that perhaps the national economies fully believe in the industry. So the law and the regulations are promoting favorable conditions for the growth of the economy with laws, with financial, let's say promotions of basically every kind of project or startup in the gaming area. So even with the talents, there are plenty of good universities, good game courses. So of course, the talent pool of great developers are being developed here in Eastern Europe. And this perhaps is also another reason why we are basically assisting to an amazing growth. And you know, it's super interesting to me to be part of it.

Tom Leonard 

So you're saying that the governments are working to promote gaming in game development in particular. Is it because of the jobs that can be created?

Mirko 

Yeah, I would say that there is a strong connection between three entities, which are of course companies, universities or like, let's say educational institutions and the government. And once the national economy believes in this kind of, you know, initiatives and long-term perspective of some kind of industries, there are sometimes stronger and deeper connections between these three entities. And of course, if the whole environment, it's like trying to promote the growth of a particular sector, this makes it easier to create a company running it and attract talents. One bright example that we are assisting right now, for example, the Saudi Arabia investment plan. They relatively recently announced a two billion dollar investment in the gaming and esports scene, which is a massive one in order to make Saudi host the most important players in the esports and game development scenarios worldwide. And this big investment plan is like aiming to realize it by 2030. So once the government, you know, tries to aim for a project like that, of course, there are all the, you know, the odds of making good stuff happening. So yeah, I believe that, you know, the impact of the government and even the universities and educational institutions can really promote or even slow down some industries. And I would say that in Eastern Europe there is a strong belief that this can be extremely profitable from a national level.

Tom Leonard 

First let's talk about universities. Because of higher education, what role do they play in promoting game development in your part of the world?

Mirko 

So as far as I know, there are plenty of first game development courses that universities are trying and they're even creating new ones where they basically teach how to be a game developer from every department. You know, like in the arts, engineering, production. So when universities give these kinds of courses, of course a young student can decide to go for this kind of career path after the diploma. So this is super cool. And I see that there are quite a lot of universities that are investing in it. I can mention the Prague Business School, which is gonna open up in 2025 a new game development course, but there are plenty of them. So, you know, this is something where I can say a lot of people are getting interested in and universities of course are trying to keep up the pace. Yeah, so for sure there is like a massive investment on this and I believe that you can really then collect the fruits out of it in the long run.

Tom Leonard 

When you talk to people, do people understand? I'm kind of being really general there, people like at the universities or at the government, do they understand how gaming can be a business and not just something frivolous and not worth spending a lot of attention on? Do people get the idea that, hey, this is really big business?

Mirko 

Yeah, I would say that if you're gonna ask this question to my mother, like a couple of years ago, most likely told you, yeah, this is like pure, you know, yeah, it's a frivolous thing, I should say it for sure. So do not use different words because Italian mom sometimes can be more direct, I would say. But yeah, from a general perspective, I would say that right now people are for sure realizing the impact of the gaming business, you know, that even from a financial standpoint, you can make a great living out of the gaming industry. Just by analyzing the fact that, I don't know right now in 2024, but for sure in the couple of years, in the last ones, the gaming industry generated more money than the music and the movie industry combined. So once we noticed, we experienced these kinds of investments of course you start thinking that this is not just playing, but it can be a profitable career. So a lot of years ago, I heard a lot of veterans that told me, no, back then in those days if you wanted to work in the gaming industry, you were not taken seriously. But likely I would say we are shifting towards a better perspective. And I'm really glad of it because when I was a kid, I always wanted to kind of maybe not work at the time, but still be part of it. And I didn't believe it, but you know sometimes judged by my parents, of course, but even like friends that told me, yeah, but it's childish. Well, no, it's not childish. It's like a really potentially profitable career. It can be in every other kind of industry, you know, in my opinion.

Tom Leonard 

No, I think it's just, I just think it's been really fascinating to watch over the years of how that has taken place. Because just like you're saying, I mean, it's bigger than games and music. And everyone thinks of the music industry as being a business. Everyone thinks of entertainment as being a business. So why are games not a business sort of thing? And it's just been interesting how people have been, you know, paying a little bit more attention. I always go back to the story of Kwesi Hayford taking his team in Ghana to Bali. And the team, the six guys that went, it's like when their parents took them to the airport to get on a plane, to travel halfway around the world to play games, it just made it so much more real for the parents that, hey, this is really something. This is really changing their kids' lives. That before, maybe they didn't just think it was like, you know, get off the computer and go find a job sort of approach to things. When I ask a little bit about recruiting in general here, because if someone is interested in getting a job in the gaming industry, what kind of, what can they do? Let's take two different, do two different people. It's like, what if someone's just starting out? Someone's in junior high school, way at the beginning of their career. What are the kinds of things that will make them more attractive to work in the gaming industry?

Mirko 

All right, interesting one for sure. I will say that the sooner you start thinking about it, the better it is, because planting the seeds early can be like a deal breaker in the long run. But there are plenty of things that, you know, someone can take action in order to make it easier. Like for example, something that for me really worked out, first of course, it's trying to understand from a professional perspective, what can interest you, you know, because the gaming industry, like as an industry itself, it's a quite big one, you know, because you can do a lot of stuff in the gaming world. You can work in sales, you can work in char, you can be a recruiter, you can be a programmer or work as an artist. You know, there are plenty of career paths. So the first thing that I would recommend is trying to understand from a professional standpoint, what would you like to do and what would you enjoy to do, you know, like from professionally speaking. Of course, as a student, you have no clue about what's the day to day and what are the activities, but you can always try to connect with people that are already doing so. And this is super easy nowadays because like, besides LinkedIn, of course, which is the easiest way, but there are plenty of communities that are unifying players and they can be players that are 15 years old, 14 years old, but also players that are 30, 40, 50, like really all the ages. And so when you jump into someone who is like a gaming veteran or working on a gaming company, you know, you can always ask, hey, but how is your like day to day, how is being a game developer, a game designer, I don't know, like a game artist. So really networking in this sense of, of course, not looking for partnership or whatever, but just trying to understand what's the day to day into a gaming company can really help out choosing, for example, which kind of university course you're going to take. So I'm a really big advocate of networking and the earlier you do it, the better it is. And the game industry has an immense lack of connecting people from all ages and from different cultural backgrounds, professional backgrounds. So it's really easy to get in touch with experienced people and simply ask them, hey, by the way, besides the, I don't know, Fortnite lobby that we are playing together, can you tell me a little bit more about this?

Mirko 

And 99% of the people are more than happy and share this kind of stuff just because we share the same passion. And so the idea of community in the gaming world to me, it's really strong. And this is something that makes me proud, you know, to be part of it, to contribute to it. And that should be leveraged since you're super young. So this is perhaps the greatest advice that I can give to someone who is starting out really trying to look for mentors for people who are willing to share. I always like to start and even ask them, which kind of advice would you give me if you were 20 years old, younger, or if you were starting out, you know? And people are really chill about that. They are willing to do so, you know, for free, of course, and like for passion. So definitely start networking and you can join Discord channels, LinkedIn, Facebook, like Game Jams, everything is like a good way. These are like a general piece of advice. Another cool thing that I can think of, it's probably to try to attend some events. Some of them like it even for free. And during these events, like what you're trying to do online, you can do it live. And of course, you know, it's a big boost for everything. Because when you're gonna meet some people, you're gonna basically reach out to them, say, hey, I'm like a young student, I love to play games. I'm thinking about making my career in video games. If you do it with someone connecting live, you can discuss the games that you love and then move into some kind of more professional conversation. And that's absolutely a brilliant way to connect with people, make new friends, learn and get started. So this combination of networking, both online and offline, it's something that, in my opinion, works amazingly.

Tom Leonard 

What about someone who's older? So if someone's, if you're just staring out, you always have the advantage of a lot of years to make a lot of mistakes and figure things out as you go along. If someone is already out there, you know, and I'm not saying how old, but someone that's already has an established career as an accountant or something else, but they've always thought the game industry would be interesting, is it something that people can switch into?

Mirko 

Yeah, absolutely. I firmly believe that the transferable skills can really help companies in different sectors. So for example, you're an accountant with 10 plus years of experience in the banking industry, insurance industry, whatever industry, and you are like dreaming to jump into the gaming world, you of course own and possess like a skill set that you

Mirko 

And this specific skill set is perhaps not findable in someone that already had this kind of experience in the gaming world. So companies can have fresh ideas about how to do things and creative ways about how to approach new ways of operating. So this can be an incredible value habit for companies, including the gaming ones. So for sure, there is the possibility of moving into the gaming industry. What I would recommend from a recruiter point of view is trying to communicate and like in an efficient way how to make the hiring managers, the recruiter understand which kind of value you can bring in, even if you're not coming from the industry, but you will possess a unique value proposition that like comes along with your different experience. And of course the willingness to learn all the things that you didn't experience in a different sector, but you're willing to, you know. So this could be a great way to jump into the gaming world.

Tom Leonard 

I think it's really good to think that people who are not just starting out to have some experience have something to bring, have that perspective. And I think if you were the hiring manager, the more different perspectives that you can have, the better your team is going to be. What's the salary like in the gaming industry versus other industries? Do people have to take a pay cut to work in a fun business?

Mirko 

Total. That's a good question, actually. So the general answer here is that if you're gonna compare, perhaps, I don't know, like software engineer, typical role, you know, like programming role. From my experience, which of course can be biased and cannot be applicable everywhere, so please take it as a very general statement, but in my opinion, there are sectors that are paying more than the gaming one. Like if I'm a software engineer working in, I don't know, financial services or banking or whatever, I believe from a financial point of view, you can make more money simply because a lot of people that are working in the gaming world are doing stuff for the passion of making games. And so this willingness to work in this industry make people more eager to accept perhaps like slightly lower compensations in order to do something that they really love compared to other interesting where, yes, you may be a fan of like a banks or I don't know, engineering companies, but to be fair, I believe that the compensation package it's super, super important into the, you know, the final evaluation of a job opportunity. In the gaming world, perhaps the idea of working on some specific games that you have played since you were a kid can really make people seriously consider whether compensation packaging will not be acceptable in different conditions. So, which is at the same time, something cool and something that was maybe, especially in the past, leveraged too much, which creates this kind of discrepancy between the gaming industry and different ones. But yeah, as a general answer, I would say that there is a slight difference, which nowadays luckily is like trying to compensate. So, that's a very general overview.

Tom Leonard 

Yeah, that's something I think you find in the entertainment business here in Southern California. It's the people, you know, I get to work at Warner Brothers, I got to work on Dark Knight and Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter. And it's like, wow, you know, people will, you know, people will accept less money, less compensation to have really, really fun projects to work on, which doesn't happen if you're in banking necessarily out there. Can you talk a little bit about that? What about from the hiring company? So what should, if someone is hiring people into the game development industry, what should they be looking for in someone that's going to succeed in a gaming business? Let's say compared to, I say if you're, I don't wanna just keep going back to accountant, but in general, the culture at a gaming company is going to be different than the culture of a lot of other companies and you know there's not you know one stereotypical one that you can think of but just in general what are the kind of traits that you would recommend the hiring manager be looking for to find someone that's gonna fit in well in a gaming company

Mirko 

That's a super cool question actually and to be fair, even along with the gaming industry, there are some differences in gaming companies' cultures. What usually makes all of them quite similar is the passion for making cool games. And this is also a key characteristic that hiring managers are already really strongly evaluating. Because, as I said earlier, every company is trying their best to make cool games. Only that, you know, this is like how it should be. So if I'm applying for a position and if I were an area manager for that role, I just don't want to evaluate purely your hard skills or your soft skills, which kind of like professional value you can bring to the project. But I also would like to see the motivation to make sure that you are on board with all the team and all the company to make sure that the people and the gamers can have a great experience. This is crucial in my opinion to also check the motivation of candidates in order to understand if the person can be a fit or not. So really the passion, like not just the passion of playing games or making games. I would like to see why you are passionate about joining my project. Like I'm developing a sports game, I'm developing a fighting game, I'm developing a strategy game. They are completely different. So I understand you might be a fan of this kind of game, but how can your expertise be translated into some real passion in making my kind of project? Because I'm pretty sure that my whole team will be very into it. They are really, you know, making a huge effort to deliver a great experience. So this is crucial to communicate during an interview and make them understand why you can be a value to the project and why you would like to jump on it. So from a motivational point of view, this is, I would say the trade that it's super important to show off during interviews. And luckily, a lot of people are really understanding that and they really, you know, are trying to do so. Like I can give you an example. As I recruited a lot of people, if they know that I'm working with a specific company, they say, no way, I have played their games since I was a kid. And I really would love to work hard to deliver on the new version of the game or the new IP as best as I can and this passion is what I want to see.

Tom Leonard 

Yeah, which is just, I mean, the industry is just so fortunate to be able to have that ability that layer on top of what it is that they're doing out there. So one of the things I wanted to ask you also about is, I hear you're interested in starting a podcast.

Mirko 

So, that's it. Yes, this is something I would love to do. To be fair, it's on my personal project pipeline list for 2024, but I'm trying to understand how to make it happen.

Tom Leonard 

So why? I'm always curious as to people's motivation. And I'm not sure, I just kind of heard from Reginald, I'm not sure what stage you are on doing it or if you've got it nailed down, it's what it is that you're going to be doing. But what got you interested in podcasting and thought that it was worth your time?

Mirko 

So I strongly believe that podcasts are an incredible way of sharing experiences and learning a lot. You can learn as a host, you can learn as a guest, and it's a great way to also meet new friends and meet new people. And every podcast embraces the spirit of connections and creates bonds, which is something that I'm really interested in and I believe it's extremely valuable, besides the topic of the podcast itself. So podcasting is a great way to connect with other human beings to make it simple. And if we are gonna think about it in my specific case, I believe that creating your own podcast can be your personal way, of course, to connect with other people that share the same passion or interest as you, but also to make an impact by helping others, learning and eventually having to hearing other stories, which can be potentially impactful on their life in a positive way. And this idea of like trying my best to support the community that I love and to share experiences, like to get in touch with a lot of people is something that really makes me feel, I don't know, the adrenaline and also feeling like sleep through the night, just to know that I'm doing something that may be valuable for potentially a lot of people out there that share the same passion as mine. So that's a great way to do so. And I hope it can work out, you know, this is the reason behind. I really would like to give it a shot.

Tom Leonard 

One of the things I keep hearing through your conversation is you like being part of a community. It was one of the things that started out with playing games and that got you into playing games maybe more than you might have been doing if there wasn't a community involved. And you are talking about having a podcast because of the community. You talking about networking, you talking about mentoring, which are really, that's a form of community there.

Can you talk a little bit about how important community is in gaming?

Mirko 

Yeah, I would say it's super important, like, because gamers have this super lack of basically sharing the same experience, you can connect with people that you never spoke with, you can be friends with people that you never saw, or eventually even had the chance to get in touch with just by playing the same game. And you know, this is a great connector between people. So for the nature of what's playing itself, especially online or even offline, you know, you can make great connections. And this connection is super valuable to me. So having the opportunity to meet new people and to make new friends just by sharing the same passion led to creating this community idea on a first, of course, local perspective, but thanks to the new technologies it is going, running on a global perspective. So it's way easier to create a gaming community rather than a community of fans of, I don't know, like as we are using the banking industry, you know, like people that are working in banks. Maybe they're completely passionate about it, but you know, in my opinion, it's not the same. It's way easier and perhaps even stronger, the kind of connection that it can create between people in the gaming world. And you know, for the nature itself of the industry, it's something that is basically running since games were created. And it's one of the best parts of it to be fair.

Tom Leonard 

Yeah, I completely agree there. And we're just lucky to be able to talk about the industry here. Wrapping up here, I just wanted to, where can people find you online?

Mirko 

Like professionally speaking or as a player?

Tom Leonard 

How about both?

Mirko 

Yeah, cool. Well, online you can easily find me on LinkedIn. Here is Mirko Minenza with a weird Italian accent. Although Mirko is not an Italian name, to be fair. I guess it's Yugoslavian origins, but for some weird reason it's been getting popular in Italy for like 20, 30 years. The original way is Marco, but yeah. So my father decided to go call me Mirko just because he finds it cooler. Yeah, so you can find me on LinkedIn easily. Online at the moment I'm playing as a weird like nickname which is Sakumo coming from one of my favorite animes and that is Naruto so I always love this character in Naruto and that's why you know it's my nickname since ages so I guess that's yeah Sakumo it's like Japanese it's one of the characters of Naruto it's kind of weird stuff but yeah.

Tom Leonard 

Okay, can you say that again?

Tom Leonard 

It's like, no, everyone has, has gamer tags that almost always require explanation. But at the same time, what I think is fascinating is there's always a story behind it. I mean, people didn't just come up with it accidentally. There's some meaning to it out there. So hey, really appreciate your time here. Good luck with your podcast. Good luck with recruiting in an industry that is really tough these days, I think. So I really appreciate your time.

Mirko 

Yeah. That's true. Yeah. Same, likewise Tom. Thank you so much for the lovely chat and best of luck with your podcast as well. Running cool.

Tom Leonard 

Thanks, thanks. So this is the Gamers Change Lives podcast. Subscribe, follow and engage with us. The most important thing is because as Mirko has been talking about community, I mean, that's the way that we build community here is for people to engage with us on social media. So thanks again, I'm Tom Leonard. Gamers Change Lives podcast. Play games, create jobs, change lives. See you next time.