Tom Miller

A Fire Burning Within

Damp Kindling. A Prelude to Fire

In writing this article, I had an odd recollection that I think is worth sharing here as a fitting introduction to my story. A strange foreshadowing of my life to come encapsulated neatly into the memory of going to the beach as a young child. On my family’s infrequent visits to the beach, (Scottish weather being somewhat prohibitive for such outings) I would stand there in the harsh cold of the grey waters at East Sands and stare down the waves coming at me. A fierce defiance surging through my veins, determined to never be knocked down by the force of the current. With each successive wave I survived I would move further and further into the water fighting indomitable nature in its own domain.

I think back to those times now, my bizarre opposition to the immutable forces of gravity and a billion tons of water. What made me want to fight that? Why is it that I was so concerned with competing against something that I could never hope to defeat, when my brothers and friends were further out splashing and playing? 25 years on and the intransigent nature of that angry little seven-year-old still resonates strongly with me. I find that whatever quality that drove me to challenge the biggest thing I possibly could, to put myself into an unwinnable situation, just for the sake of seeing how I would fare, has had a truly profound impact on my life and everything I have done and achieved.

Some people call this nature Grit, or Drive, or Determination. Regardless it is the relentless force of will that drives the desire to achieve what you set out for. Driven people are the ones that never stay down, never give up and always bring the full force of themselves to bear. They are the relentless. They can be meek or powerful, shy or boisterous, introverted or extroverted. Anyone can have that fire burning in them and it is important to realise that being driven is not a masculine trait and being driven is not the same as being competitive. Many driven people, like myself, do not try to compete with others, they compete predominantly with themselves.

It’s easy to put this down to an innate self-discipline that is bestowed by mother nature, but actually self-discipline is still a challenge for me as it tends to be for most people. Our brains are distractible. They have weaknesses no matter how passionate or driven you are. A key part of being successful in life and in your career is not just playing to your strengths, it is understanding your weaknesses and mitigating the situations that manifest them. My weaknesses are distraction, absent mindedness and an overactive imagination.

In school I struggled for every medium grade I got and was devastated by each failure. I struggled to read and write as coherently as everyone else or understand the concepts put forward to me and trying to learn things that I didn’t understand was torture for me. Dyslexia, dyspraxia, visual perception and visual memory problems and a venerated seat on the intangible autism spectrum have stymied my academic exploits for all of my life. I had to work twice as hard for half of the result, but the joke is on life because working hard is what I’m good at!

School and university didn’t resonate with me. I found I needed more support than other kids and boy did I suck at asking for that support. (Ok maybe another one of my weaknesses is a bit too much pride). I worked diligently and despite the efforts of some excellent teachers I never quite felt like I was hitting my stride. I had a defiant determination, but the fire was missing some key fuel or catalyst. It wasn’t until a few years later I would find out what I was missing.

Finding Fuel

From my very first job, at my very first company, on the lowest possible rung of the lowest possible ladder I knew something was different. Something clicked as a key environmental variable slid into place. At that moment it was like someone stoked my fire with jet fuel.

My job at the time was to test video games and write bug reports for them. It was low level work, intensive but with direct metrics. The harder and longer I worked the more bugs I logged. Over the weeks and months, I could see my total bug count go up, and I could see that number relative to every other tester almost like a leader board. In addition to that very clear metric I found the harder I worked the more recognition and opportunities I received. This recognition and reward cycle, along with increases in my pay, meant I had very conspicuous reasons for putting everything I had into my job. There was finally a tangible reward function, something I could see and grasp at the end of every day that gave me direct feedback. There were long term goals, there was recognition from my bosses on a regular basis and for the first time I felt like I knew where I was going.

It didn’t take long for me to start scrambling up the aforementioned ladder. After six months I moved to a company nearer where I lived and within three months I was promoted to Lead Tester; another three months after that I made the big move into a development studio. My job there was no longer just to write bugs; it was to manage the migration of code and data to over a hundred developers. I still had to test the game, but I was given the time and opportunity to do whatever else I wanted. I found that the game I was testing didn’t really need me very much. Before long I had automated half of my job away by writing simple programs to do everything for me. This freed up time for me to take on more responsibilities.

I made a habit of taking on work that no one else wanted to do but that needed to be done. This strategy worked really well for me as the number of cool bits of work and areas of responsibility grew and grew as I found ways to be more efficient and faster at performing those roles. However even the best will in the world can’t help you when you bite off more than you can chew. As the project increased in scope, those areas that I had taken ownership of started to inflate and alas the temporal nature of the universe meant that no matter how much I worked I couldn’t do everything. Things started slipping and I started failing.

Fireworks!

But in a half-decent company you’ll find that management doesn't actually want you to fail, and they’ll usually work to make sure it doesn’t happen. And so, it wasn’t long into my second major project at Creative Assembly that I had my own department greenlit.

I was now the lead of the newly invented Build Engineering Department, and probably the most proud I have ever been in my career (and possibly my life). My team and I were in charge of a huge variety of things, from the distribution of thirdparty software to version control management systems and integrations. But fundamentally my job and the bottom line for the department was to “maintain the stability of the build”. In layman's terms that means to ensure that the game was working correctly and that everyone on the project could work effectively. I updated my Facebook profile to “Archon of Stability at Creative Assembly”.

I was still relatively young in my career at this point, only 29 when I received my title. To be a department lead with a team of employees before the age of 30 was a rare feat in the video games industry. I had also begun making a name for myself outside work as well, writing industry talks and mentoring students at a number of colleges. I really started to get involved with outreach programs, particularly with kids from disadvantaged backgrounds or learning disabilities. I hope to teach them that they can thrive despite impairments that are outside of their control.

It was that year, in the twilight of 2017, that I was nominated and subsequently won a place in the Develop 30 under 30. It’s a games industry award designed to recognise fifteen women and fifteen men who have had promising starts to their careers and show the potential to go on to have profound impacts on our industry. It’s a big deal in my industry, there are very few awards of recognition that aren’t lifetime achievement awards. Moreover, there are thousands of potential applicants for every year of the 30 under 30. After receiving the award, myself and a young woman I work with, who also won, were summoned without warning to an ominous meeting with the CEO. But he emphatically congratulated us, shaking our hands and telling us he had big expectations for us. Following that he wrote an email to the whole company to say as much, all of which was a little daunting as a closet introvert, but delightful nonetheless. I can only hope that I live up to the award and represent myself favourably compared to everyone else on that list.

Since then I have written and presented more industry talks, keynoted conferences, written articles and continued my work mentoring London college students. I am now the Senior Lead Build Engineer at Creative Assembly and my career continues to advance. I am going back to school soon to learn new things and in general I am assessing new directions as I suspect I will end up owning my own company at some point and need experience within business management.

I have learned I am not an easy person to be close to. For that reason, I am both endlessly grateful and apologetic to those who have helped me and put up with my stubbornness over the years; my mother, my learning support teachers, my managers and my best friend. They have been a major force in shaping and directing my drive and taking the edge of a fire that can singe others.

Through sheer force of will, a bit of help and no small amount of that obstinate stubbornness I have been able to thrive despite the chains nature and fate have placed on me. There is no divine Providence here, lifting the weight of those shackles have made me stronger over the years and so I wade, unencumbered, deeper into unknown seas. Pushing with the full force of my being against the challenges I have put before myself.

I have drive, I have fire and I am only just getting started.

Tom Miller, Class of 2005