Gabe Newell: Reflections of a Video Game Maker

Gabe Newell is one seriously awesome dude. It’s not so much that he runs, Valve, one of the most significant video game companies in the world; but that he runs it as a flat organization without traditional “management” roles.

It’s a fascinating organization because their practices fly in the face of many other practices you find in the software industry today. Amongst some of the more interesting facts about life at Valve include,

• Management is for n00bs
• Everyone in the organization is expected to talk with customers. It’s not the roll of a special department…
• Projects are expected to recruit interest internally. There’s not someone telling you what to work on…
• More…