From pro esports player to business: 3 things I learned

More and more often I get asked the question: "What have you learned from gaming that you can use in other parts of life?". The boom of esports means specially new parents are getting exposed to it and wants to know if their kid has a future (They do, relax), but definitely also the world of business who sees a big paradigm shift in how recruitment and talent is fostered and screened nowadays. I spent the better parts of 4 years competing around the globe in Counter-Strike 1.6 and played thousands of hours of DoTA2 & League of Legends. Here's 3 things I learned:

Accepting failure as part of improving

Arguably the most important one I've ever learned, and the basics for this are very simple. The best of the best of elite esports teams and players, do not win 100% of the time. No one does. Over extended periods of time they might have done it, but it's well proven that the best teams and players have around 65% win rates, with a strong emphasis on winning the important games, and the greatest of all time have around 75%. Remember, this is at their very peak, being dominant in what they compete in. On the way there, they all practiced countless hours, lost thousands of games, iterated, analysed and found ways to improve and overcome the opponents that were in front of them.

None of this is rocket science or new knowledge, the difference is that gaming gives instant feedback on tolerating and learning from losses, while our adult business lives are much more nuanced and filled with career progressions, degrees, the want for peer recognition and so forth. When I've been in my nerdiest periods, I could easily play 12-15 games a day. If we assume I was a 55% winner for most of that time, that's a lot of losing you have to deal with, but looking back I realise how great a learning it is, and it is what carried me all the way to become a pro player. As long as you have your mindset set on improving by mistakes, losing in gaming makes you grow as a person and a player.

Rapid decision making and iteration

Computer games are fast and action packed. Constant action, decisions, opportunities, fighting and crunching in an endless world of possibilities as to how you decide to play the game. Usually the games are complex as well. A game like Riot's League of Legends, have over 140 different champions to choose from, and you need 10 of them in a 5vs5 match, providing a vast amount of different dynamics the game can play out in. Then the fun begins:

Game starts, and within minutes you need to figure out the strategy. Do we fight early, where do we fight, who hits first, what do we do if they do X. Fighting usually starts within 2-3 minutes and is ongoing with short breaks. Think of this scenario: you enter a fight with tons of variables, and you lose. Within 2 minutes you need to figure out why you lost, how to fix it, while adjusting to a dynamic changed because of the lost fight, so new variables are in play. And the enemy? They are coming right back for more, because they got momentum and want to win. A new fight, same thing. Win or lose, figure it out instantly and go for the next objective, until you finally destroy the enemy base or they destroy yours. Instant feedback, good and bad. It's the purest form of lean execution, and businesses spends millions upon millions of dollars every year to try and implement more lean strategies in their core. It's built right into gaming. It's beautiful.

Collaboration

Almost every competitive game out there is a team game. Counter-Strike is 5 people together, working towards winning 16 rounds against an enemy team, in short rounds of 2 minutes each. You have to figure out strategy, individual roles, plan A, B, C and sometimes have to come up with completely new strategies on the spot cause things aren't working, doing a ton of communication in the process. I've been fortunate to take on some international challenges as well, being the in-game leader of a Spanish team (without speaking Spanish - great idea, I know!), played with a mix team from Portugal, a Swedish/Danish team and have played practice games with people of just about any nationality you can think of. I spoke fluent English before we started on it at school, only because of the internet and gaming.

Having to adapt to different cultures, personalities, strategic mindsets and philosophies have given me tremendous insight into how team building works and how to correctly set the composition of high performance teams. I don't believe it's something you ever master, and I work on it every day still, but I'd like to think that I had a huge head start given this background. Online gaming is born global and is a universal language that transcends borders, cultures, race and colour. Without a doubt the thing I love the most about what gaming have given me.

I could probably go on with many more, but I'll stop it here. I truly believe the wave of esports will grow to massive strength and unite future generations much more than we have seen before, and I am excited to be right in the middle of it to experience it. Feel free to reach out if these are things that could help your business, personal life or anything else. Always happy to help. Hope you enjoyed the read!