Fun place, grid-locked on progress. - Product Owner Riot Games Employee Review

Thanks for your review, each one helps candidates better understand Riot, and we really appreciate that you took the time to write it. It’s awesome that you find Riot’s culture strong and that it’s an amicable environment to work in - that’s what we want: a place where Rioters can come and work with others that share the same passions. You’re right that our culture of continuous feedback can cause loops in development - Riot’s product owners have the challenging responsibility to weigh player, stakeholder, and Rioter feedback to do what’s best for the product. We know we can do better here, and I highly recommend that you reach out to team leads to identify and work through the friction. You mention that there aren’t many accountability mechanisms for repeated failures - we want to be the kind of environment where failures aren’t met with punitive action because we know that taking risks also means risking failure. Having said that, it’s worrisome if you’ve identified or observed Rioters not being held accountable, but I also recommend giving benefit of the doubt. We’re not in the habit of making an example out of Rioters, so it’s possible that the accountability mechanism is there, it’s just not visible. If you continue to observe repeated failures from the same individual(s), the best way to highlight kinks in the pipe is to reach out to relevant Rioters (other leads, product owners, senior leaders) to understand where these projects aren’t succeeding, and how to determine next steps to move them forward. Riot grew rapidly which means that our ability to scale our communications fell behind, not to mention manager’s bandwidth stretched pretty thin, pretty fast. Our focus is hiring more leaders for that reason, but we know that doesn’t make the growing pains any easier to tolerate. I hope that you use the channels that currently exist to offer feedback regarding the struggles of management: AMAs, one-on-one’s with your lead, or reach out to a talent partner. We know we’re far from perfect and have a lot of work to do to improve communication at Riot, and we really appreciate that you took the time to write about your experience. If you have any questions or suggestions on how we can improve, feel free to reach out to me at avanderhelm@riotgames.com. Thanks! Ann