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Gabe Newell: Reflections of a Video Game Maker

The LBJ School · 918.8K views · 2013-01-31 · 1:02:53

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Overview

Gabe Newell, founder of Valve, gives a talk at the LBJ School on productivity, economics, political institutions and the future of corporations. He discusses Valve's hiring and pay, its flat structure and an open-office anecdote.

On Hacker News

HN cites it for how Valve works: hiring unconventional talent, paying by value, firing as aggressively as hiring, and why open offices fail.

Recommended by 2 HN people across 2 months · HN mentions 2013–2017

Topics

Management, leadership & organizationsTech company stories & documentariesTech pioneers & interviews
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valvegabe newellmanagementhiringopen officeflat organization

What people said

teamonkey · 2015-03 · Recommendation

One of my favourite anecdotes about open offices is 22m in to this video[1], where Gabe Newell of Valve talks about his desire to have one office per person and how it didn't work out in practice. Bonus: he mentions Peopleware. [1] [VIDEO]

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MakingOfGames · 2014-05 · Recommendation

If you like this type of content, check out the Reddit subforum [LINK] , which covers behind the scenes footage and 'making of' material for video games. There's an alphabetical listing of all submissions that you can use to search for a particular title. [LINK] Press CTRL-F on that page and try searching for your favorite game. Searching for 'Valve' will lead you to the numerous developer commentaries that Valve has included in their games, similar to cast commentaries on DVDs. Valve founder Gabe Newell gave a talk about productivity, economics and corporations that you might find of interest: [VIDEO] A good article during the final hours of Half-Life 2 development is this one written by Geoff Keighley: [LINK]

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zamalek · 2017-01 · Reference

According to Newell[1], Valve aggressively fires as it hires. It's not based on stack-ranking bullshit - more of a cultural and disciplinary fit. If you have the right personality you could thrive there, but if you need a manager to help you shine it's best to look elsewhere. [1]: [VIDEO]

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Sources

Video by The LBJ School, played through YouTube.

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