Quality of Life SIG

International Game Developers Association

Special Interest Groups Alternate Reality Games Artificial Intelligence Casual Games Flash SIG Game Accessibility Game Design SIG Game Education Game Preservation Human Resources Independent Developers Intellectual Property Rights Localization Mobile Game Development Online Safety Online Games Outsourcing Positive Impact Games Production Quality Assurance Quality of Life Sex in Games Students Tools Women in Game Development Writing

FAQs What is a Special Interest Group (SIG)? How do I join a SIG? How do I establish a SIG?

The Quality of Life SIG advocates fair, healthy working conditions for game developers.

Overview

QOL issues are often daunting. There are many facets, no easy answers and many opinions. However, QOL is not something we can just ignore and hope it gets better on its own. This Special Interest Group looks to address the tough questions related to the issue and strives to make a real difference, championing good quality of life solutions that work for all parties.

Goals

• Keep abreast of current QOL trends in the industry by:

1. keeping a collection of links to current writing about QOL in blogs or publications
2. conducting a yearly IGDA QOL survey and publishing the results.

• Research and publish papers about QOL best practices within the game industry and related industries
• Provide feedback to developers on QOL-related legal issues
• Provide feedback to the game industry community on the QOL status of as many specific studios as possible.
• Reach out to and educate developers on QOL issues, providing them with tools to help improve their own QOL and the overall QOL of their own organization.
• Provide a grievance committee to manage complaints from IGDA members about employer policies that are in contravention to IGDA standards. More details about the grievance committee.

Resources

Please check the Resources page for news items, reports and research into Quality of Life topics.

See the SIG History page for a brief timeline of Quality of Life events, chairs, volunteers and other historical information about the SIG.

Please note: The IGDA Quality of Life webpages are out of date and pending new web development teams and access will be updated/removed/revamped as necessary. The forums will be consolidated and corrected as well.

Projects

The SIG has a number of projects being worked on by members, below are the actively maintained ones. To join a project (we always need volunteers!) see the lead member of it, and to suggest new projects contact the SIG on the mailing list, or SIG chair by email.

• IGDA Quality of Life Survey 2010
• IGDA Quality of Life White Paper 2010
• Employment Quality of Life Standards (ECQC)
• Grievance Committee (This is a continual part of the organisation, not a set project)
• Quality of Life T-Shirts
• Captain Crunch Award

Related projects in the IGDA:

• IGDA Code of Ethics

Major past completed projects of interest:

• IGDA Quality of Life Survey and White Paper 2004

Contact and discussion

You can contact the SIG confidentially at qol -at- igda.org

You can join in the discussions on the formation of the Quality of Life SIG at this mailing list, and contribute to the general Quality of Life discussion on the forums, after becoming a SIG member.

Please note: The IGDA Quality of Life webpages are out of date and pending new web development teams and access will be updated/removed/revamped as necessary. The forums will be consolidated and corrected as well.

Membership and Organisation

There is a current membership list is available on the IGDA website of all the SIG's members. The committee is currently co-chaired by;

• Michelle Hinn
• Keith Fuller

Additional committee members are:

• Casey O'Donnell
• Scott Berfield
• Andrew Armstrong

Previous Leadership

Previously the SIG was being lead by Sheri Rubin before elections took place of a committee. Before that it was lead by Judy Tyrer with a steering committee consisting of Chris Oltyan, Dustin Clingman, Erin Hoffman, Sheri Rubin and Tom Buscagalia. SIG members (active and inactive) are currently tracked by membership of the mailing list and main IGDA SIG. Please join both to keep in correspondence with the SIG.

Previous committee members are thanked for their hard work and are listed here.