Six months of management training with Duo Performance

When I became a Team Lead on the multiplayer of Assassin’s Creed IV Black Flag, I took part in a management training programme with Duo Performance, a training company based in Annecy.

It ran over six months, with one session a month lasting from half a day to a full day. We were a small group of five or six: young leads like me, and sometimes associate producers who wanted to work better with their leads.

The everyday side of leading a team

Each session focused on one part of the job: giving feedback, delegating, handling conflicts, keeping people motivated, running meetings.

We also covered time and project management, the part I have used the most so far. With a growing team and mocap shoots to plan, a clear method quickly became essential.

Everyone is different

What stayed with me most was the work on communication between MBTI personality profiles. Everyone is different, so how do we understand each other, and how do we talk to each other?

It gave me more empathy, and concrete tools to adapt the way I communicate to the person in front of me. Without putting anyone in a box: a profile is a starting point for the conversation, not a label.

The lead I want to be

These six months also showed me what kind of lead I want to be. Management for its own sake does not really appeal to me: I would rather stay hands on in production, and bring these tools to the team from there.

Cover photo by No Revisions on Unsplash.