Production Leadership & Pipeline Architecture

The Challenge

A smaller team needed a manageable production process, clearer delivery expectations, and faster workflows for ongoing content updates. The existing Jira setup had become more complicated than the team needed.

My Role

Simplified production tracking, established a weekly story-content schedule, and modernized art and animation workflows. Combined production leadership with hands-on contributions where the team needed additional capacity.

Simplifying Planning and Tracking

Replaced a convoluted Jira setup with a Trello Kanban board paired with a delivery spreadsheet.

The board supported day-to-day work tracking, while the spreadsheet provided the broader schedule. Together, they gave the team a simpler way to connect active tasks with upcoming deliveries.

Modernizing Asset Production

Rebuilt the art pipeline to incorporate generative AI tools for 3D asset creation and introduced video-based animation workflows in place of Spine-based production.

These changes multiplied our output. I also managed third-party vendor relationships and tool integrations to support the revised workflows.

Supporting Delivery Across Functions

Led creative production for user-acquisition campaigns, testing and iterating ad variants.

For an app release, I personally produced all in-game audio and sound design, covering a delivery need without adding an external audio resource.

The Challenge

The team needed a faster, more consistent release cadence and a reliable way to connect planned work with actual delivery. Deliverables and due dates spanned multiple disciplines, while Jira’s reporting capabilities at the time did not provide the cross-team visibility leadership needed.

My Role

Managed a cross-functional team across art, animation, technical art, and audio, and coordinated production planning with engineering. Fort Knox reached the Top 10 in the App Store Slots category.

Aligning Production With the Release Schedule

Streamlined art production processes and prepared the team to work against a new release schedule. Over approximately two weeks, I aligned workflows and team expectations around the target cadence.

Connecting the Roadmap to Actual Progress

Designed and maintained a master delivery spreadsheet that brought deliverables and due dates across teams (including engineering) into one high-level view.

The spreadsheet complemented Jira and Confluence. It was manually updated through a checkoff process tied to discipline-specific approval milestones, including engineering approval to proceed to code review and art approval.

This gave leadership a consolidated view of delivery progress and helped keep the roadmap grounded in the work moving through production.

Enabling Technical Improvements

Worked with technical artists to identify opportunities to improve production workflows. During the early adoption of generative AI tools, I demonstrated how AI could assist shader coding and shared examples the technical art team could build on independently.

I also contributed to live-ops performance analysis, asset pipelines, and marketing production, connecting ongoing content delivery with the needs of the live product.

The Challenge

Develop original game concepts that could diversify studio revenue and give executives a clear basis for deciding which opportunities to pursue.

My Role

Directed a cross-disciplinary incubator team, directly managing two managers and their groups. Coordinated creative development, audio, technical art, and engineering prototyping to move ideas from initial mechanics to functional builds.

Turning Concepts Into Proposals

Conceived and scoped original game concepts, then presented executive pitch decks outlining the proposed experience, scope, resource needs, and revenue targets.

The work connected creative ambition with the practical requirements of development, helping leadership evaluate what each concept would take to pursue.

Building the Team’s Delivery Capability

Mentored junior producers and established production practices to support cross-functional execution. Shaped responsibilities around individual strengths and growth goals while keeping the team focused on broader business priorities.