Wednesday, September 13, 2006

Building a Team


Some boards I did for Monsters Inc.

As a superviser at animation studios and as an owner of my own studio, team building is a skill that you have to learn. If you don't know how to put together a good team you run the risk of imploding your projects. Hiring the best talent you can find is an obvious way to build a good team but this alone is not enough. If you have deep pockets and you hired the absolute best talent money could buy for your animation department, this does not guarantee a good film. In fact I would waiger that the opposite would happen. It would be like starting a company and hiring Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, Richard Branson, Warren Buffett and Jeff Bezos to run it. A disaster waiting to happen.

At Pixar, we would have lunch with prospective team hires
to makes sure that they weren't a**holes. I really liked this practice because it made sure that everyone got along. The one weakness of this idea is that it tends to promote the hiring of similar types of people. Not that great for diversity.

When I build a team, I like as many different personalities as posible. I really like the way the personalities play off each other. I would hate it if everyone were to agree all the time. There are only three things that I require from every team member.

Passion for animation.
Passion for the studio or project.
Respect for other artists.

I'll give specific examples of my ideal team in future posts.

5 comments:

Randeep Katari said...

Hey Ric,

You have no idea how relevant this is right now.

thanks
-R.

Cookedart said...

Amazing boards Ric!

I gotta agree with Randeep on that - I think just about everyone around here is thinking about the aesthetics of a fairly large team production and it's various pitfalls - and it's no doubt pertinent to see how the pros put one together!

Take it easy!

Mr. W said...

Well said bro... Can't wait to get back in the office and get some work done.

Randeep... Thanks for the kind words on my blog.

Anonymous said...

while reading each n every statement i was going to the prosses of happening such kind of passionate stuff. i do respect to ur skills and thought process. wish u all the best . thanks....

Doron Meir said...

Well put! Thanks for sharing that.