Meet CTW’s Customer Support Specialist, Kelsey Godwin

Path to CTW

This is our series on the team working at CTW.

Today, we’ll spend some time with Kelsey, one of our original customer support specialists. She’s an invaluable member of the team, building up our business and working closely with our players around the world. She shares what it takes to survive and thrive at CTW.

Tell us a little about yourself and why you came to Japan?

Ever since I was little, I was obsessed with Sailor Moon. But I actually didn't even know it was from Japan, or that there was such a thing as “anime,” until I was 13. So when I did, it was like rediscovering my favorite cartoon all over again. I decided I really loved the language when I heard it for the first time and I knew right away that I had to go to Japan.?

At 13 years old, I started self-studying Japanese and set myself a goal: I’d go to school to learn it officially and that’s exactly what I did. I graduated in Japanese language and culture studies at university, and from there, I quickly realized something. “Oh, studying in the US won’t get me to where I need to be. I have to go to Japan, get immersed in it, and live the language.” So I came over here as a teacher, and now, five years later, I’m somehow working at a video-game company in Tokyo.

It’s crazy!

When I first came to Japan, I was in the boonies, a place called Takahashi — a very, very rural area. We were just surrounded by mountains and rice fields.

Coming to Tokyo after that was terrifying. The culture here is so different from everything I’d experienced until that point. I was worried about so many things: I was worried I wasn't gonna make any friends. I was worried it was going to be expensive.

But also, on top of that, I was so excited because, to be honest, I didn't want to live in the countryside forever. I wanted to challenge myself by making it in the biggest city in the world! And now, even after two years of living here, it’s still amazing and exciting to me.

The Japan I’d dreamed of as a little girl? I’m here and I love it.

My favorite thing about Japan is how polite everyone is. You know, everyone knows how to be welcoming in their private lives and keep it super professional at work. It’s on a whole other level, especially coming from working in the customer service industry in the States. We don't know how to do it like the Japanese. So that’s very nice and relaxing.

And also, of course, as a self-proclaimed Otaku, my other favorite part of Japan is the manga.

If I could change one thing, I’d change how many Japanese people view foreigners. Everyone's nice to us for the most part but there are things we have to deal with that can be hard sometimes. I wish I could show them that not all of us are loud, not all of us are disrespectful, and a lot of us love this country just as much as they do.?

What surprised you about working at CTW??

Well, I've worked in customer service for a long time. Since I was 16, I was working at a restaurant and eventually became the assistant manager there. I thought, “Oh, I know customer service like the back of my hand. I can do that,” when I applied for the job. I was totally unconcerned about that.

But working in a game company just felt so different, right from day one. It’s a completely different atmosphere. Honestly, while it's been a great experience and this is the best team I’ve ever worked with, it was overwhelming.

When I saw how little I’d actually known about the video games business, I got impostor syndrome so bad. You have so much to learn in a short time and I was completely out of my element in that respect.?

But little by little, as the two current team leaders trained me, as I started to take on more and more responsibilities, I started to see things in a new light. I saw what was working and what wasn’t, and got to change it by voicing my opinion. The better we got at it, the more independence we had, the more we were making our operating rules, our own manuals, and ways of dealing with each player issue.

So it was really intense every day, learning so much, earning more trust, and now it’s finally getting easier because we’ve become such a strong team by going through it all together.

Whenever someone new comes on, we have to teach them about all the different rules. Each G123 game has different ways of how things need to be done, with a different set of rules for interacting with the players. At first, it was hard for me personally to take it all on board and make sure to do what I was supposed to be doing.

But, we’ve made it work really well and now I can’t imagine doing anything else!

What’s it like working in Customer Support in video games?

It's a lot easier doing customer support online, that’s for sure. You know, when it’s face-to-face or in real-time, if you encounter an angry customer, you get a little rattled. You don't have time to think through the best possible response and explain things as well as you’d like. But when I'm doing it online, I have a chance to take a moment and think about what I need to say. It's a lot more satisfying like that and better for our players too.

Not to say that it’s not challenging. I’d say the most difficult part of the job for me is when players report other players. And a lot of the time, it's not anything we can really help with. They report cheaters but what looks like cheating to them doesn't go against our guidelines. It’s just other players knowing how to play the game better. It's hard to explain that in a way that's not going to make them angry. And the second hardest thing is when we have to make balancing changes in our games. There's nothing we can say to players when we’ve nerfed something that was overpowered that will make them happy. We just have to think of the best way to tell them and deal with what comes after.

As for the best part about my job? It’s my team.

I mean, they're just the best.

When you have a tough case, or when you’re dealing with something serious like a bug, players can get pretty angry. You get a giant wave of anger from so many people. Of course, even though you know it's not personal, you can take it personally.?

Being able to talk about it with your team, being able to laugh about how heated some people get, it makes everything so much easier.

I also think there’s a couple of things that would surprise you if you were coming into the video games industry.

I was really surprised by how much work goes into this kind of profession. Of course, I knew it was a lot of work. But I never realized how many tiny details there are. Like the testing. We have to test everything so many times on a trial server to make sure nothing goes wrong when the game goes live. We constantly monitor our games to watch for bugs and exploits. The localization work is immense and the game planners have so many things to think about and do in their work. You need so many people to make one game run perfectly. That was shocking to me, honestly.

And anyone thinking of joining Customer Support specifically? We’re always looking for someone who will get along with the rest of the team, someone who's friendly and outgoing, and who’s willing to help when the rest of the team needs it

Also to do CS, you have to be pretty empathetic. A lot of our players come to us when they're very upset. You have to learn how to empathize with them and understand what they're feeling. Having that as your mindset really helps you calm them down at the end of the day.?

So if you love games and you genuinely want them to succeed, if you’re the kind of person who cares if something goes wrong and wants to help by jumping in, you’ll do well here.

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For more information about our available positions, have a look below.?

We’re actively looking for talent in the following roles.

Customer Support — English

https://apply.workable.com/ctw/j/74777D4D98/

Non-general-hour Customer Support — English

https://apply.workable.com/ctw/j/3AB0150038/

Game Operations Support — Korean

https://apply.workable.com/ctw/j/6A61341968/

Global Game Planner — Danish (Translator and Localizer)

https://apply.workable.com/ctw/j/C41F79B415/

Global Game Planner — Korean (Translator and Localizer)

https://apply.workable.com/ctw/j/FA7A5CDA1C/