This document outlines best practices for human resources in game development companies. It discusses goals like enabling developer success and improving relationships between developers, publishers, and retailers. Some key HR best practices presented are conducting roundtable discussions, mandatory meetings between managers, an open book management style, performance reviews, hiring temporary workers, linking bonuses to performance, knowledge sharing, and rewarding top performers. The overall aim is to implement practices that support employees and business goals.

1. BEST HR PRACTICES

2. GOALS OF THE BUSINESS
 Enable developers to build stronger, more successful companies
 Provide knowledge and business support resources
 Increase the perception of game development as a credible
business and raise the profile of game developers as viable
companies
 Improve the publisher/developer relationship
 Improve the retailer/developer relationship

3. THE BEST PRACTICES
 Roundtables & Reports
 Mandatory meetings with producers and department
managers
 Recruiting
 Open Book Management Style
 Bonuses
 Performance Management Feedback System
 Hiring Temporary Workers

4. ROUND TABLES
 A round table is one which has no "head" and no "sides",
and therefore no one person sitting at it is given a
privileged position and all are treated as equals

5. MANDATORY MEETINGS
 Conduct regularly scheduled, mandatory meeting times
with producers and other department managers to discuss
individuals and their performance, training needs,
succession planning possibilities, etc.

6. RECRUITING – The Process
It is well known pet peeve that hiring managers begin the
process
with the vague idea of what they are exactly looking for.
 Job Description – Hiring managers must review it.
 Each year Requirements and criteria change
 Post jobs in Company web site
 Once having Candidate – Telephone Screening, Conduct
Behavioral & Technical test
 Face to Face Interview

7. OPEN BOOK MANAGEMENT STYLE
Sharing information about contracts, sales, new clients,
management
objectives, company policies, Employee personal data etc.
 This ensures that the employees are as enthusiastic about the
business as the management
 Through this open book process we can gradually create a culture
of participative management and ignite the creative endeavor of our
work force..
 It involves making people an interested party to your strategic
decisions, thus aligning them to your business objectives.

8. 360 DEGREE FEEDBACK SYSTEM
 This system, which solicits feedback from boss, peers and direct
reports if there are any, has been increasingly embraced as the
best of all available methods for collecting performance
feedback.
 The feedback is therefore inclusive and every person on the
team is responsible for giving relevant feedback, whether
positive or constructive.

9. HIRING TEMPORARY WORKERS
Due to the nature of our business and the long production
cycle
which requires head count flexibility, the hiring of temporary
workers is seen as the most creative, cost effective method
to
increase efficiencies around the ebb and flow of the
production
cycle.

10. KEEPING IT LEGAL
 Put together a list of organizations you can turn to for legal
advice in the ever- changing world of HR.
 References should at least include membership in a
national human resource organization and links to your
national, state or provincial government.

11. SAFE, HEALTHY AND HAPPY
WORKPLACE
 This will ensure that your employees feel homely and stay
with your organization for a very long time.
 Capture their pulse through employee surveys.

12. PERFORMANCE LINKED BONUSES
 Bonus must be designed in such a way that people
understand that there is no payout unless the company
hits a certain level of profitability.
 Additional criteria could be the team's success and the
individual's performance.
 Never pay out bonus without measuring performance,
unless it is a statutory obligation.

13. FAIR EVALUATION SYSTEM FOR
EMPLOYEES
 Develop an evaluation system that clearly links
individual performance to corporate business goals
and priorities.
 Cross – functional feed back, if obtained by the
immediate boss from another manager (for whom this
employee's work is also important), will add to the
fairness of the system.
 Relative ratings and Normalization of evaluation is yet
another dimension of improving fairness.

14. KNOWLEDGE SHARING
 When an employee returns after attending any
competencies or skills development program, sharing
essential knowledge with others could be made
mandatory.
 Innovative ideas (implemented at the work place) are good
to be posted on these knowledge sharing platforms.

15. HIGHLIGHT PERFORMERS
 Create profiles of top performers and make these visible
through company intranet, display boards etc.
 It will encourage others to put in their best, thereby
creating a competitive environment within the company.

16. REWARD CEREMONIES
 Merely recognizing talent does not work, you need to
couple it with ceremonies where recognition is broadcast.
 Looking at the Dollar Check is often less significant than
listening to the thunderous applause by colleagues in a
public
forum.

17. DELIGHT EMPLOYEES WITH THE
UNEXPECTED
 Delight with unexpected things that may come in the form
of a reward, a gift or a well-done certificate.
 Reward not only the top performers but also a few others
who are in need of motivation to exhibit their potential.