 Welcome to the wide world of eSports, the show devoted to all things eSports. I'm your host, Katherine Norr. Today we're discussing eSports job recruitment and staffing. My guest is Tim Schotzer, the managing director of Onward Play. Welcome, Kim. Hi, thank you for having me. This is so exciting. All right, so what is Onward Play? Thanks for asking. I will dive right into it. So Onward Play is a division of Onward Search, which is a staffing firm that's been around since 2007. And we've been staffing in eSports and gaming since 2007 and really in recent years have made a big push to eSports because it's growing and the industry's doing well and booming. And there's a lot of these companies that need hiring resources and help, whether that's designers, producers, camera crew, production people, media people, artists, community managers. So we're really covering a lot of things in tech and creative and art and production for these eSports and gaming companies and it's an exciting space to work in. So I bet a lot of people would be curious to know about 2007 because that seems to be going back quite a while and it seems that the real industry growth has been more recently. Can you tell us about how you ended up starting in 2007? Onward Search began in 2007, mainly staffing in digital marketing, traditional marketing for a lot of corporations across many industries, not just gaming. So we had our hand really in every type of industry from fintech to e-commerce, any type of ad agency, marketing agency, entertainment company, film. We were working all across and we were just seeing a ramp up and a big pickup in games and toys and tabletop and casino and especially mobile and VR and AR and AAA and it's really just grown tremendously since then and as far as eSports growth, we've been tracking the industry for a while and as we saw more startups happening in eSports and more exciting new technology eSports companies and new vendors in the eSports space trying to help with eSports law or eSports production or media rights or advertising or partnership deals or talent agencies like there's so many companies around the world of eSports that support it that we said we really want to sink our teeth into staffing in this space and it's turned out really well in our favor because gaming and eSports grew 20% since the pandemic so we've been doing well. So do people call you a headhunter? Sure yeah headhunter, recruiter, my team really they're specialized game recruiters so they know everything inside and out about all the tournaments all the leagues who's playing in what what countries are doing you know what kind of conference or festival or tournament you know they're very aware of the M&A activity that's been happening gaming lately and of course all of the you know new game titles and what ships in what month so really we as recruiters not just know a little bit about eSports and staff in this space but we like eat breathe live sleep everything eSports and gaming which has helped us tremendously just with our knowledge base when we call a client we could truly say like we understand what it is that your gameplay engineer needs to do to create and build and ship this game or we understand what it's like trying to find the right branding and sponsorship person for your eSports organizations you could find the right partnership and grow. So I understand that you are also a member of the eSports trade association if people are looking for a job in the space do you think it's good to be a member of a trade association like that? Absolutely I mean that's where you're going to make a ton of connections I do recommend joining ESDI because it is really the first association in the game industry and what they're looking to do is you know create best practices and be a very non you know partial you know education resource for a lot of people looking to get into the industry or to find more What led you to work in staffing and job recruitment? That's a great question it's funny I did not grow up a gamer and I grew up loving theater and I went to college for theater and singing so it's just so funny that I ended up in you know games staffing but really what it is is sales and being a people person and I do pride myself on not being you know sales sharky and I think in eSports and gaming you always have to tread lightly when you go into this type of client base because they're not looking to be pitched to and sold to all day long people in gaming are looking for community they're looking for a network and that's why the eSports and gaming community is so tight knit and it's this little community that gets like kind of break into to let them know hey I'm one of you and I get what you do and I understand what you're building and the greater good of everything you're making at your studio or everything you're doing with your league trying to you know advance your team so you know we really understand it on a higher level and I think what you know making me so passionate about this space is just seeing an industry and it's very you know young stages morphing and budding and there's not just eSports leagues and teams it's of course all the people that service the eSports industry but there's also eSports tourism and we're seeing all the major fortune 5000 companies try to get in the eSports and gaming space in some type of way whether that's through a sponsorship or they are you know helping build an arena in a major city and you know changing tourism in that city and there's just so many other ways that eSports is impacting people colleges there's a whole college section of of eSports so I just find it very fascinating that it's an industry that has grown so fast in such a short amount of time and has gained so much popularity that there's you know just massive investment and funding in this space in a VC or a startup perspective but also in the big fortune 5000s and that's what interests me it's the industry that's growing and doing well it's it's not going away anytime soon you know it's interesting because Hawaii is a tourism economy essentially and you know I would really like to see it ad gave me an eSports to our eSports our basic tourism economy I did notice that Japan even before the pandemic had there was a hotel I think in Tokyo maybe it was somewhere else where it was an eSports hotel and I think that they have those kind of properties across the country have you seen that um yeah there is a mix of eSports with every type of industry you name it there's a mix of eSports and food a mix of eSports and hospitality a mixture of eSports and cryptocurrency I mean we're just seeing it interjected every type of way and I think that's because a lot of companies are saying how do I capitalize on this growing um you know entertainment and form of entertainment and of course with the Olympics happening right now we're hearing about you know can eSports be a part of the future Olympics and will it really truly finally be recognized as a real sport and and you know the age-long question that people have been asking for decades about eSports um and it's just gaining that notoriety and I'm not surprised people are trying to monetize eSports any way they can and I would love to stay at that hotel it sounds fun so what is a current landscape in the gaming industry in terms of the job market sure so like I said we work with all different types of game studios so not just eSports but um you know your console pc um you know studios your indie studios um your massive triple a big corporate studios the publishers um you know tabletop and so we really see what everyone in the industry is up to and we get to view the industry from up above where we say all right these are the trends here are the patterns this is what all of the clients seem to be wanting this month or this quarter or we're noticing you know since the pandemic there's many new studios starting brand new IPs and this is the trend of like what they're looking to do and of course in eSports the trends we've been seeing in the landscape have a lot been around eCommerce um eSports you think it's about leagues and playing no no no it's about making money through fashion and lifestyle brand and the content and the youtube and the TikTok and it's all about creating like a vibe and um eSport companies and game studios are trying to um you know really lean into building those types of branding and marketing teams but also the you know sales teams where they can maybe um put their game on a toy or put their game as an NFT um or you know put their um players on a t-shirt and and try to monetize off of that so we're seeing a lot of trends happening in that direction which is exciting um but typically what's popular right now are producers I think a lot of eSports companies are just trying to find folks that can do the overall creative vision and say here's the vision for our youtube page and where we should take our content or this is how we can highlight our sponsors or how we can highlight our players and talk about d and i at the same time or you know x y and z initiative and um it's an exciting landscape um to to see because I I'm watching it all unfold in front of my eyes as we try to push towards post pandemic world right now of course delta is squashing some of those dreams I have a lot of um eSports clients and game studios that can't go back in office and fall like they thought they were going to which is unfortunate but um you know really what's popular right now are producers and directors and people that can kind of come in and run the show because you know eSports had to make a big adjustment when the world went remote as far as how they run the back end of their their teams and their businesses and it's hard to find that senior level talent that knows what they're doing and kind of run a team remotely and still you know be profitable and push growth sure and you know it's interesting that you mentioned the olympics in relation to eSports because I was actually watching videos yesterday about whether eSports will be an olympic sport and what's interesting about the olympics and I'm sure many people are watching it right now is that the olympics is really a sponsorship event and a security event and so the the focus on sponsorship and security is as big as it is on the athletes and the competition uh you know so I so I think that's kind of interesting do you have any thoughts on that um yeah that's a good note I would say you know a lot of eSports players right now I'm seeing are getting compared to a lot of you know sports players and even like you said in you know for compensation or how their contracts work with these leagues and how long they play or how long they're on a team or you know what they're obligated to do there's a lot of differences between eSports and regular sports and that's the one adjustment if they really did go to the olympics that I could see you know being a discrepancy and our last eSports trade association call somebody was mentioning how I you know these eSports players can make you know triple or quadruple more than the Wimbledon players will win whereas in Wimbledon you're working you know sometimes 25 30 years in your career towards it and someone in eSports can pick up the sport in high school and then play in college and then go off to go pro and um you know find a lot of profitability for themselves on that on that team and do well so I think the industry is is definitely different than traditional sports but I would love to see it continue to push towards something like an olympics that'd be an exciting day and I know it's in our future. Sure and so what is innovative and unique about onward play staffing services? Of course that's a great question because there's literally tens of thousands of other staffing firms out there. I think what we do different in eSports in gaming is that we really push diversity equity and inclusion and we always have since 2007 that's been part of our vision and mission so what that means is when I have an eSports company that comes to me and says hey we have a d and i problem we're only seven percent diverse on our team or 15 percent diverse and we want to bring that number to 20 or 25 or 30 how do you help us um you know what we can do is help with that d and i targeted strategic sourcing so we have a database of hundreds of thousands of game and tech candidates and many eSports candidates and so we really have a full scope on who's working who's passive who's secretly looking for their next job in eSports or gaming who's under the table you know hunting for their next role and we're able to say you know let's be strategic about who we bring to you of course without being discriminatory to any you know underrepresented group or anyone at all but these eSports companies have a long way to go I mean almost all of them have very little women leadership very little women in the tech roles but maybe more women doing like the e-commerce side of the eSports league or doing the marketing team instead of maybe some other positions like production or you know camera or editing so our goal is to bring them as many diverse candidates as we can and we do that by partnering with recruitix which is a recruitment marketing firm and they have a program called diversity reach so we're able to go through them and our eSports clients and our game studio clients their job orders get pushed off to not only all of our networks and gaming eSports people but also indeed LinkedIn zip recruiter and then over 80 historical black college and university alumni boards as well as you know community and diversity job boards and community boards for underrepresented communities for disabled or AAPI or black or veterans so we're casting the widest net we can to help these eSports companies bring in some different you know backgrounds and voices and faces and try to change the industry in a way that we can so that's really you know near and dear to our hearts because you know we're female led division I'm leading us and I gotta make sure we get you know more diversity in these companies that's so desperately needed to survive. Sure and so how do you recruit tech creatives leaders and artists in the gaming industry? Sure so a lot of it right now is is passive cannabis like right now we're working with one of the major eSports leagues and you know they're looking for you know certain team members to bring on and we really have to go in there and head hunt and go after people and say you know this is what this new opportunity could be and how the benefits level up to what you're making now and what you're doing now but also here's your career trajectory here's your opportunity that this new company can bring to you this is what their league is doing or what their next IP is that they're you know building and how you could be a part of that I think a lot of people when they are in eSports or gaming roles they can get creatively starved so sometimes just telling them about the opportunity creatively is enticing but right now we are seeing eSports and game studios paying above market rate for producers directors technical people engineers editors motion graphics vfx you know you name it they're paying a little bit more right now because there is a talent shortage in the industry so when we go to candidates we're very aware that we're the fifth recruiter of the day writing you but here's what our client can offer you that's different than what you're doing right now. So how do game studios partner? Sure so how you know game studios or eSports companies partner with us either we find them or they find us or you know a lot of our business is through word of mouth so we have happy customers that tell their friends about us and and then we work with them and typically they come to us with a problem that we want to solve so we want to go in not just as a sourcing company to send you resumes but we're here to really find matches so I'm not going to you know my teams are going to go into a new client and throw them 15 resumes throw it at the wall and see what sticks like we're going to find you the exact two or three people that are a true match for everything in that job description and that could add value to your team instead of just be a culture fit it's someone that's going to be a culture add and so that's what we look to do with these clients but a lot of times they come to us and say you know help us with our D&I sourcing strategies our recruiters are having a tough time right now or help us fill this temp position or this full-time permanent position and then we dive in and we start the search and set up some interviews and hopefully that candidate gets an offer. So how would you distinguish yourself from something like LinkedIn and they're you know they're essentially their job kind of rules in terms of being a kind of online free connecting people. Sure so there's a lot of the LinkedIn's out there but specifically to gaming and esports there's over 20 game specific job boards and what's hilarious is a lot of the clients that I go in and start working with they're like yeah we're spending 15 or 20 grand a year posting our jobs in this job board and it's getting us nobody and the candidates are like very you know inexperienced and completely not a fit for the roles and you know I've seen a lot of pain points of AIM Studios and esports companies by posting on those boards and how we're different is you know we have these personalized connections with these candidates and we build rapport with them and have long phone calls and know exactly their heart's desires of their dream companies and where they want to go and you know what rate they're willing to take and you know where they're willing to move to where they don't want to move to and we know like all the inner workings of that candidate and where they're looking to go in their career whereas in a job board you know a lot of the people on there just throwing resumes you know into jobs they might not be a fit for hoping that they get an interview and we really match the talent for exactly their skill sets to what the client is looking for and our database definitely helps us with that but that was through you know thousands of hours and years and years of hard work from recruiters finding all these talented people getting them in our database and in our network and then tracking them throughout their careers and helping them make their next moves and jump ship and all of that. Okay so there's going to be a lot of people watching this who are looking either to change jobs within gaming or move into gaming or esports or they're you know they've never really had a job in the industry but they have a lot of talent. They might wonder like how do you get paid because they don't know if they might have to pay you or like how that work. Oh of course with the staffing agency you don't pay us we don't take anything from the candidate the client for a contract or freelance role we're charging them a markup on top of the candidate's hourly rate and then if it's a permanent direct hire position we charge the client a placement fee for finding that candidate so it's really free of charge for candidates and often we have candidates that write us and say you know I'm only junior level only entry level or internship level you know I know you probably don't have roles open for me that can you help me with my resume or can you give me advice on what I can do and I do spend a lot of time in my week kind of counseling people trying to get in the industry and get their foot in the door and my biggest word of advice that's going to be different than what you're hearing elsewhere is like you have to know everything about everything about everything about that industry or you know the games that that studio builds so if that studio that you're applying to or maybe you're targeting 10 studios that you want to get an internship with or a junior level role with if they are unreal studios you need to take unreal engine courses you need to learn about how the games are built how that you interact with the engine to make the game happen like you have to become an expert on all things back end of a game studio and it's different in the tech world you know where maybe it's just the developers at a company that have to know the programs and the languages that's not the case in gaming like you have to like even producers or directors or you know c-level executives have to know how to interact with unreal to build a successful game even the marketing people so it's important that you really learn about how games are built and then on the esports side I would say a background in any type of production or youtube or content or social is definitely going to help in esports as well as the branding communications and marketing side because there are so many esports companies right now where a large part of their revenue model is the merchandising side and that's an easier way to get into the industry rather than trying to get in by being a player or you know by being the cinematographer right like only you know every game studio only needs so many cinematographers and videographers to you know help their leagues out so you want to go in with like a real life skill set like something like a marketing or a social that would definitely help so do you only recruit for the united states or is if someone from another country wants to come here and work do you work with them sure most of our clients don't offer any work authorization or sponsorship we do a lot of work in Canada though there is a great esports community up there and then of course the US coast to coast we cover unfortunately I have no clients yet in Hawaii but that's going to be one of my goals by the end of this year I got to check out the Hawaii business landscape sure well you know we certainly want to you know create more of a esports or gaming industry but I'm not I think it might be a little bit slow so what type but like specifically if someone is looking for a job in esports what particular jobs are you staffing for sure right now in esports we have a lot of project manager production video editors brand partnerships business development manager sales people it's really hard to for a normal sales person to try to go to a esports company and make it it's a different swagger it's a different style in esports and gaming then you know your average sales so that's the position that we've seen openings for we've also been staffing some diversity and inclusion roles since that's a very popular topic in gaming these days there's a lot of companies hiring people success or employee success or diversity inclusion or more HR help to make sure they're well rounded in that sense going forward as they build and you know we're also seeing a fair share of like marketing people and social media people we even do a couple c level searches for some esports companies that are growing really fast so if anyone's in creative marketing production tech video you know VR gaming that's really what we cover all right and so how can someone transition from a job in tech to a job in gaming yeah that's a really good question I get this one all the time actually of like hey I'm a graphic designer how would I become a game designer or you know hi I'm you know doing some you know video work how would I transition that in from entertainment into esports it's really about finding a mentor in this space so do some LinkedIn searching see who has a comparable job to you but in an esports or gaming company write them and say I'd love to you know buy you coffee or you know give you a gift card for your time but I'd love to pick your brand on how you got started that like mentoring and putting yourself forward is really important and it's tough in gaming because people tend to be a little introverted but you know I definitely recommend reaching out in that way but as far as you know jumping in and trying to find a role I do recommend for people to study it any way they can there's a lot of great certification courses and you know degrees out there and courses online they're even free that will tell you a lot about the industry it will help you get in just so you can go into those interviews prepared we know what you're talking about but you know graphic designers for example if they just learn unity or unreal and if they start doing like faux mock-up projects and their portfolios of some game work and saying all right well let me just lay out you know the UX of how I designed this level of this game or these characters for this game versus what I did on the web before for an ad agency you could start building something of a portfolio so you could show I'm versatile I can do web I could do software and you know I have no experience in gaming but you know here's my portfolio of things I've done on the side and it's all about showing like how you went above and beyond and built your portfolio and that would be a good way to transition is just start a lot of side hustle join you know game jams go to IGDA join all the associations that you can join ESDA for esports and really get involved put that on your resume because it shows the client that like I'm in the mix I'm I'm in this gaming community I'm trying hard to you know make a stance here and I'm part of all the meet-up groups and the Facebook and LinkedIn and and all those fun discord groups and yeah so what are VR and esports and gaming managers looking for when they look at a resume sure I mean they're looking for a resume that tells a story so if you're all over the place and you have a side hustle business and you like photography and you like you know of all these things going on sometimes that's not as as attractive in the esports and gaming world it might work for business or corporate because it shows you're well-rounded but in gaming esports they want to see that you are an expert in your space because there's so many people trying to get in to the business that they want to see that you really have the skill set and what it takes to do the job so they want to see that your resume tells a story so if it's confusing and there's different random things all over the place and you wear too many hats it's almost like you're a jack of all trades and not a master at any and so you know definitely having a focus in your in your line of work but also like you know showing the managers that you know what it is that you want to do and you love what it is that you do because you go above and beyond like that kind of stuff showing it on a resume I'm in the clubs I'm in the associations that go to the game jams it really shows that you you know encapsulate your world around that industry and you'll be able to add value for them sure and you know so what has the pandemic what is the impact of the pandemic had on the industry for you sure I mean we saw a big growth in in March of 2020 when the pandemic hit we had a lot of clients coming to us saying you know we have a lot of roles opening as people are staying home playing games so it's just been very exciting to you know fill these roles quite fast with these studios growing faster than ever before and these esports leagues are really booming and building their presence during the pandemic so we've been busy hiring and staffing all their creative and tech people so if someone wants to reach out to you how do they contact you sure so you could visit us at www.onwardplay.com we're also on LinkedIn and Twitter and Instagram and all those fun places you can find us on discord as well and our recruiters are really everywhere so it's hard not to run into one of us but our emails info at www.onwardplay.com if you want to send us your resume or if you're a studio and you need some help hiring all right well thank you Kim it was great to have you on the show thank you so much for your time and thank you listeners it's really awesome to be on this podcast I do listen to you so this is exciting and thanks for having me all right so thank you viewers for joining us today make sure to tune in next week my guest will be Ulysses Carcamo Bonnet head of marketing and strategy at Shaky Corp see you then