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“If a community doesn’t exist and I want it to exist, I will make it” with Gabriel Sanchewski

The Community Lounge Season 1 Episode 3

Today Gabriel Sanchewski tells us about his journey from avid gamer to community manager.

Gabriel and I talk about how he even before he was officially a community manager, he would just roll up his sleeves and create the community resources he noticed were missing.

And we hear about how Gabriel came to create and run The Break Room, a private Discord server for community managers.

Games mentioned in this episode: RuneScape, Wizard Wars, Halo 3, Magicka: Wizard Wars, Questland, Squad Busters, Super Auto Pets, Marvel Snap, Silk Song

Find Gabriel on:

The Discord servers we mentioned:

The Community Lounge is brought to you by Feature Upvote: Painlessly collect feedback from your players. More insights, less noise.

Transcript

Steve McLeod
Today, Gabriel Sanchewski tells us about his journey from avid gamer to community manager. We hear how even before he was officially a community manager, he would just roll up his sleeves and create the community resour he noticed were missing.

Welcome to the show, Gabriel.

Gabriel Sanchewski
Thank you, thank you, thank you for having me.

Steve McLeod
And for the record, can you please say your surname properly? Because I’m sure I pronounced it really badly.

Gabriel Sanchewski
Sure, no worries. No, it was pretty close. It’s Sanchewski written out. It’s actually meant to confuse English speakers and Polish speakers because if you read it in English it looks like Sanchewski, but if you read it in Polish it’s Sanchewski, but it’s Sanchewski. So it does not discriminate.

It is hard and I’m always surprised whenever someone says it correctly.

Steve McLeod
Okay, I don’t feel so bad that I actually had to pause a bit before saying it.

So as I said, welcome to the show. Look, tell us about yourself, your path into becoming a community manager. Let’s start at the beginning.

Gabriel Sanchewski
I’ve been in the gaming industry for about 10 years now, so if we travel about 10 years before that, I was playing games. At the time I was playing a lot of Runescape and there was a big change in Runescape where they changed the way that combat system worked. And I was kind of like, okay, this is my opportunity to finally stop playing, you know, and find something else.

So I was looking for like the next thing, right? And I found this game online by Paradox Interactive called Wizard Wars. And it seemed like a really interesting game, it was like very niche.

So I checked it out and me, I’ve always been into forums. The first forum that I ever joined was the Bungie forums for Halo 3. I was super big into Halo, so I would post on forums, browse forums a lot. So naturally for me, the first thing to do when looking at a game is to look at the forums to see what’s going on.

So I think the first post that I made on the Paradox Interactive forums and the sub forum of Wizard Wars was, “hey, can anyone tell me about this game? Because I’m thinking of playing it and when I play something, I go really deep into it, so I want to make sure it’s worth my time.”

And yeah, it fascinated me and it was really cool. So I started playing it and Wizard Wars was like a MOBA type game based off of the Magicka franchise, where you like queue up spells and there’s different types of spells you could do. This was like PvP.

So I was playing that and it was, it was a hard game to kind of master.

So I was like, I’m gonna make an academy.

Steve McLeod
You made an academy?

Gabriel Sanchewski
I made an academy. And the purpose of the academy was to teach new players how to play. Because if you join a game and then you just get stomped on it like you don’t want to play again because there’s no fun in that. So we would, the game would lose players. This because of the steep learning curve. So I made an academy, taught new players how to play.

And this was just for fun. I was very active on the forums. I think the community kind of recognized my name. I was even making some videos on my free time about the game itself.

And so from this, the community manager at the time, and this was in 2014, sent me a message on Steam and I still have a screenshot of this message because it was life changing.

It was pretty funny.

Inviting me to help out with the Magicka Wizard Wars booth at PAX east as a community member.

Steve McLeod
And you accepted?

Gabriel Sanchewski
Of course I did. I had to make sure he wasn’t joking.

And I was like, oh, what? Really? And it was, you know, they’ll pay for the hotel, they’ll pay for the flight. I had never flown in a plane before, so this was like crazy for me. And I’m from South Florida, Miami, living there at the time. And so it’s really hard to travel from Miami. I mean, everyone’s like, wow, Miami is so cool. But it’s like all the way at the bottom of the States, so everything is really far away.

So Boston, yeah, that happened. Pax. I flew out, I met the devs, I met other community members because it was me and some other community members helping with the booth.

So that was like my introduction into the gaming industry. And I did not think that that would happen. It was very surprising.

And there’s a funny moment from that trip where helping to set up the booth, we were carrying boxes. There’s a lot of boxes and you know, event management and setups.

So I’m carrying boxes, I’m saying hi to everyone, kind of. I’m very excited. I want to get to know everyone that, you know, works at Paradox. So as I’m carrying boxes from a van to the booth, I see someone next to me and I’m like, hey, so what do you do at Paradox? And they respond, “I’m the CEO”. Just alongside me, carrying boxes. And that was the first time that I met Fred, which is currently the CEO.

So it was funny. That’s like the box story, you know, so casually just carrying boxes into the booth.

Steve McLeod
What a good CEO though, that he’s there helping with the hard work.

Gabriel Sanchewski
Yeah! It was an amazing event. And so after that I get back home and because I’m active on the forums, I’m there like every day, the community manager was like, well, you know, we could use some help on the forums, like maybe you can have a part time gig doing moderation. You’re on there anyway, so you may as well moderate. And I was like, okay. So I was contracted to do some forum moderation, which was cool. And that was like my start into the community management because I think moderation being on forums is a big part of the job.

And then that went on until the end of 2015 where Wizard Wars unfortunately shut down as a game, which was very sad.

But you know, all good things must come to an end. And because Wizard Wars was shutting down, there was no need for me to moderate a forum anymore. So that was the end of that work.

Steve McLeod
Like the end of an episode really.

Gabriel Sanchewski
Yeah, it was.

Steve McLeod
But your work as a community manager didn’t stop there, I’m sure. Tell me more.

Gabriel Sanchewski
Exactly, it didn’t. So after that I made some connections and networking and meeting new people in the industry. And in that space I started working part time for a company called Strategy Mill that was working on sort of strategy games.

Paradox Interactive, for those who don’t know, focus on strategy games publishing. So this was kind of like natural to work for a small startup company that was also doing strategy games.

So I was working at Strategy Mill and since it was only like a handful of us and this was part time work, there was a lot of things to be done. So managing the website, doing the brand, writing articles, reaching out to press to look at the game, there was like a lot of things that I didn’t have experience with before that. I was just learning from this part-time gig.

And that was until 2017-ish, that I stopped working there. And then something happened in 2017 where all of a sudden Paradox Interactive comes again into my life because the community manager that invited me to PAX actually thought of me when Paradox was expanding and basically said, hey, there’s a lot of games in the pipeline, there’s a lot of work to be Done. You’ve worked with us before. Would you like to come back and help us with like social media management and continue do moderation on the forums, you know, and this can be a part time job again. And I was like so surprised and very thankful for this offer. So yeah, I said of course.

And I started working for Paradox again around 2017. And around this time I also moved from the States to Europe, to Poland. And the plan was to live in Poland for one year, but it ended up being now it’s like seven years.

Steve McLeod
What happened that turned one year into seven years?

Gabriel Sanchewski
Well, so my partner got a scholarship to do research. He’s half Polish and this was a great opportunity, a Fulbright scholarship. And he basically said, hey, would you be down to move to Poland for a year for the scholarship? And I was like, yeah, of course. And it was a big move going from Miami to Poland.

Huge difference.

Steve McLeod
When I think of Miami, well, the sun-soaked images, like the really old Will Smith song video clip and Poland – I’ve been there a couple of times and I just remember being cold a lot. Whenever I was outside, I just wanted to get inside again.

Gabriel Sanchewski
Yes, it is very cold. I think there’s a big, there was a big culture shock as well.

I mean, I’m Hispanic, I’m Cuban, Colombian, Mexican. So going from this kind of Hispanic culture into the Polish, very serious, very, you know, don’t talk to me unless there’s a good reason for you to talk to me kind of culture was a big shock.

But yeah, it was a big move.

And then after the year was over, we actually loved it. I mean living in Krakow was great and it was fun and it was just so different. And I think the European kind of lifestyle was different from the Miami lifestyle, of the grind and the competition and everything is just so expensive and there’s just so much traffic. And I say Miami is really nice to visit, but I would not want to live there again. So after the scholarship was over, we just decided to stay.

At the time I was thankfully working for Paradox part time, but I was like, you know what, I’ve had these part time roles which have been really cool, but I want to be officially a community manager in the gaming industry. You know, I want a job that is like community manager, not like for a moderator or like helping out with social media.

So there was this conference, Digital Dragons, that I mentioned in 2017.

So I went there before going to the conference. I was sending my resume out to different companies and one of the companies that I sent my resume to, they had a booth at Digital Dragons. So this is like a B2B-type of conference where devs have their games and you know, looking for publishers and just for the gaming industry. So I talked to them, I bought a ticket to the convention, I was able to meet them. And this, the company was called Gamesture. And the person that I was talking to actually recognized my name when I told them my name, because my name is, I guess, unique in the sense that it is Sanchewski because it is stylized in a Polish way.

But I don’t think it’s first of its kind. It was a legal name change.

My partner and I created a new name.

Previously I was Sanchez and now Sanchewski.

Steve McLeod
Oh, that’s awesome.

Now you’re telling me, I see it entirely.

Gabriel Sanchewski
Yeah, yeah, it catches the attention of the Polish people.

So. But in general it was really nice. They said, oh, I recognize your name and your resume was really good. And I was like, oh, thank you.

With the work of Strategy Mill and Paradox.

So we were chatting, really nice conversation. And that turned into me having my first job in the gaming industry officially as a community manager working in house. So I like went to the Gamesture office.

Steve McLeod
Are you in Krakow?

Gabriel Sanchewski
In Krakow, yeah. And that was like validating my kind of experience of like I did it! I’m finally officially a community manager!

Steve McLeod
Did you contact your mum and you say, you know, all that time you told me I spent too much time playing computer games and I should be working on my career instead. Did you tell her, look, it worked out?

Gabriel Sanchewski
Yes, something like that, Yeah. I mean previously when, when I was working in the States and I was doing the part time work remotely. So I’ve been doing remote work since the Paradox work. Because Paradox is based in Sweden. I was working from Miami, I was working at a grocery store, you know, so from grocery store doing this part time work and now I’m a community manager. It just naturally evolved in this way. So it was big changes and I was super proud and happy about it.

But that’s my path into community management and how it happened.

Steve McLeod
Moving on, I understand you run a private Discord for community managers. Tell me how that came about.

Gabriel Sanchewski
Discord originally I think was geared towards gamers. So that was like their main focus.

So naturally being in the gaming industry, an app for gamers, they wanted perspective and they wanted to be very close to others in the industry. So there was actually a private Discord server for gaming industry people.

Steve McLeod
So this was invite only?

Gabriel Sanchewski
It was invite only, yeah, I don’t know if secret is the word, but yeah, it was very exclusive, you know, you had to be vetted.

And there were Discord employees in the server so you can easily contact someone from Discord.

There were people from the product team as well that were there. So you know, changes and asking questions of like how can we improve this feature?

And just getting that feedback directly from devs and the gaming industry. So it was really cool server. So I think Discord started pivoting a little bit with their marketing and as they got more popular they went from focusing on gaming to being just like a general application for everyone. You don’t have to be in games – anyone can use Discord. And I think there were internal changes as well and some like layoffs and whatnot. So the server kind of got phased out and it was merged into another kind of pseudo-private Discord server which is called the Discord Admin community.

So this server is a server for admins to learn from each other and to get feedback. And there are also Discord employees in this server as well. But the scale is like huge because to join the server I think you just some like benchmarks that your server needs to be. And if you’re an admin of a big server, you can kind of like join the server. So they kind of merged the industry server into this huge community with civilians, if I could call them, you know, non-industry people.

And that kind of changed the whole feeling of everything, you know. Now all of a sudden people who are moderating like Fortnite servers or you know, admins of these kind of servers are there with like community managers of huge games.

So I think a lot of people in the server from the industry kind of felt like it was a little off and they didn’t want to engage as much and the vibe was just different.

So I kind of saw this and I was like, man, we’re losing this resource. And I would like to keep this, like, place and me being huge discord nerd. I was like, if no one’s gonna do it, I’ll do it myself. So I just made a copy as much as I could of that industry server and I invited all of the community managers, the marketing people, but mostly, like, focused on community managers of the industry. I invited them into the server and yeah, that’s how it started.

And now there’s, I think, like a little over 300 community managers in the server. I keep it very low key, very, how do I say, low engagement in the server. Because as a community manager, I know how many servers you’re in and I didn’t want it to be another thing that you had to like, oh, I have to check it every day and, oh, what’s going on in here?

Steve McLeod
You don’t want it to be noise, you want it to be helpful when you need it.

Gabriel Sanchewski
Exactly. And the name of the server is “the break room”. So I want to emulate that kind of environment of a break room of when you’re at work and your time and it’s kind of crazy. And there’s like a room that you can retreat to that is more calm, quiet. You can kind of like relax a little bit, you know. And if a coworker comes, you know, this is the break room, so it’s different, the things you can talk about, you know. So that’s the kind of server I try to have and maintain. And it’s funny because the most popular channels, I would say, are the venting channel and the job discussion channel.

Steve McLeod
Actually, I already had in my mind that the next question I wanted to ask you is, like, how much is it an opportunity for people to rant privately? And it’s exactly that. But, you know, community managers need that. Like, it’s a lot of times you have to keep this very happy face on all the time, dealing with mostly positive, nicely happy players. But sometimes some players are anything but that. And nevertheless, you can’t go down to their level, right. You need a place, you need an outlet. So I think that’s really nice that you’re doing that for yourself and other community managers.

Gabriel Sanchewski
Yeah, I just maintain it, you know, I don’t try to control it too much. I’m very, like, hands off about it. If someone wants to join the server and they’re in the industry, I send them an invite, but I’m not like, pinging them. I’m not making any announcements.

I don’t even kind of make noise when someone joins. I only mention them if they make an introduction, so you can kind of join and lurk.

So it’s a very, very chill server, the way I like to keep it.

Steve McLeod
I have in front of me here the link to the application form to be part of this community management private Discord. Is that something I can publish in the show notes or is that something you prefer?

Gabriel Sanchewski
So the one that I posted actually is a different server, a different kind of server that is more open to the public and that server includes those who are aspiring community managers.

In the show notes, I’ll add a link to “the break room” as well. But there are a couple of different types of meta community management, gaming industry servers. But yeah, sure, that’s fine. To publish, I review each application manually, individually, to vet those coming into the break room to make sure it’s a nice environment, nice, safe environment.

Steve McLeod
Great.

That’s the important thing, isn’t it? Just letting in people after screening and being ready to do something quickly when you find the wrong person gets through.

I ran a community myself a couple of times online and yeah, eventually that became all I was doing was managing who was part of it and who wasn’t. You don’t want to be exclusionist, but you also want it to be a nice place and one or two people can really ruin the whole thing.

Gabriel Sanchewski
They really can. That is a great point.

Steve McLeod
So I see a theme throughout your career. So you started this academy for, was that for Wizard Wars?

Gabriel Sanchewski
Yeah

Steve McLeod
And then you started this Discord server. Like if you feel like something you want is not there, you just go and do it.

Gabriel Sanchewski
Yeah, pretty much.

Steve McLeod
And that actually was a big step on the way to becoming a community manager.

Gabriel Sanchewski
Yeah, definitely. If there is a community that doesn’t exist, and I want it to exist, I will make it. Because if you don’t do it, who’s going to do it? You know?

Steve McLeod
Fantastic.

So I wonder a bit about how you learned to be a community manager. Like you were just running, you were doing some of the community manager-like tasks, but then you got this opportunity to work half time as a community manager.

How did you know what to do on your first day on the job, on your first week, first month? How on earth did you know what to do?

Gabriel Sanchewski
Yeah, that’s a great question.

Let’s see. I mean, thinking back to a Gamesture I think would be a good example because with Paradox, I was new, I was already on the forum. So kind of moderating a forum is something it wasn’t too hard. And for me, in other communities I would see how like, bad forum moderation would go and people get banned or people would go on power trips and stuff. And like, for me, I didn’t get any, like, I don’t get dopamine from banning someone, you know, that’s just not me. So it wasn’t too difficult to moderate a forum and my goal was like, for it to be a nice place because I was part of the forum too, you know, I wanted to engage in discussions. So as long as everything was nice, then I was fine. But when I started working at Gamesture, I think a lot of it is just learning and being open to learn.

There were things that I started to do that I never did before, such as how to respond and deal with feedback on reviews in the App Store. The game that I was working on at Gamesture, Questland, was a mobile game. So there were reviews and one of my jobs was to go out and respond to reviews, focusing on negative reviews, but of course positive reviews responding to them as well.

So that was like, how do you interface with this environment? What are the rules? Why is the Apple Store so different from the Google Play Store? You know, learning all of this on the spot.

So I think it’s a matter of just being open to learn and using Google. Like, yeah, there’s no shame in it if there’s something that you’re not sure about, like ask questions or look it up.

A lot of the job is just learning because a lot of situations come up that you’ve never encountered before and it’s just, well, you adapt. And I think that’s how it was when collecting feedback. What’s the best way to collect feedback and to organize it for the devs? And oh, maybe this is a bit too harsh and it looks like the devs might be demotivated. How do I kind of change it while still containing the productive spirit of this feedback? You know, you just learn over time how to do these things.

Steve McLeod
With the App Store were you given guidelines on how you should go about responding to the negative feedback or you just use your own judgment?

Gabriel Sanchewski
I think common sense goes a long way.

I think if you use your common sense and there’s a sense of also, like professionalism that you need to have when you’re responding to things because you are representing the company and the reply will come from like Questland, I think.

So it’s like, yeah, you’re using the voice of the company.

So yeah, just use common sense. Be respectful of course, put yourself in the other person’s shoes. I think these kind of things are simple things that if you remember to keep in mind, you’ll be like, okay, how would you like a company to respond to you if you have, if you made a negative review, you know, and just go from there.

Steve McLeod
So that is a good time to segue into what other tips you might have for people wanting to become a community manager or for first time community managers. What tips do you have in general?

Gabriel Sanchewski
Yeah, I think for those who want to become a community manager, I would say start your own community, you know, make your own Discord server. If you make your own Discord server, you will see all of the admin that comes with being a community manager and setting things up and be active in the spaces that you enjoy. If there’s a Discord server that you really like of a game, check it out and see how it’s broken down. What do the community managers of this space kind of do? And try to copy that in your spaces as well. And then you will learn how to do it. Like how you just start naturally googling things and learning these things by yourself.

I didn’t do any formal schooling, but you know, school is helpful too. Marketing communications, if you want to get a degree in that, that could be really helpful. Set up your LinkedIn, volunteer as a moderator. You can follow Victoria Tran on social media because she is just a superstar in community management world.

Steve McLeod
She is a person I would very much like to get onto this podcast. If you’re listening, Victoria, you have an open invitation.

Gabriel Sanchewski
I will message her and see if we can make that happen because yeah, she just knows so much. Her newsletter as well, like subscribe to it, it’s really fun to read.

So that those are tips if you want to become a community manager. And if you are a community manager, I mean I would say people who’ve been in the industry for 10 plus years still feel like a newbie. And we talk about this in the break room.

Imposter syndrome is very common in this line of work. So you know, if, if you’re feeling that way, you know, just know that others who have way more experience than you also feel this way. So it’s okay, you know, and just continue learning and being open.

There’s like hard skills and soft skills that you can learn to make your job better.

And you know, you can just list them all out but just always be open to learn new things.

Steve McLeod
That’s really great. Thank you. We’ve almost run out of time today. So I’m going to ask you the final question I ask everybody who’s on this podcast. What game have you been playing lately?

We’re on to the important questions now.

Gabriel Sanchewski
I’ve been playing a lot of Squad Busters, which has been fun, from Supercell.

My “turn off my brain” game is Super Auto Pets, which is my guilty pleasure.

Steve McLeod
I don’t know that one.

Gabriel Sanchewski
Yeah, that one’s fun. And Marvel Snap, I’ve been playing some Marvel Snap and all of this as I wait for Silksong.

Steve McLeod
Silksong is what?

Gabriel Sanchewski
Silksong is like the next game from Team Cherry after Hollow Knight. If you’re familiar with the game Hollow Knight, Silksong is like the next thing. And the community has been waiting for this for so long, it’s become a meme. But everyone is very understanding and we’re kind of just letting Team Cherry take their time. Like take however much time you need.

We know it’s going to be a good game, so we’re just giving them their time. But yeah, it’s waiting for that one to release.

Steve McLeod
Fantastic. Well, that’s all we have time for today. Gabriel, thanks again for being on the show.

Gabriel Sanchewski
Yeah, thank you for having me.

Steve McLeod
Now, where can listeners get in touch? Apart from the Discord you mentioned or the two Discords, are there anywhere else where listeners can get in touch with you?

Gabriel Sanchewski
Yeah, you can add me on LinkedIn sanchewski. If you search it, I’ll probably pop up. On Discord. If you want to add me on Discord, you can add my tag, it’s trance. And then with the period at the end. So T R A N C E. And then period.

And then on Twitter, @SoundOfTrance. That’s like my online handle and most places Sound of Trance.

Steve McLeod
Great. I’ll make sure that’s all in the show notes. So thanks again and bye, Gabriel.

Gabriel Sanchewski
Thank you. Bye.

Steve McLeod
Bye everyone.