Jose Felipe Alonso Simarro

CTO at Taproom

Interview

Felipe is CTO of Taproom. His day-to-day work consists of developing new features for video games and improving processes. In addition to his interesting experience, he has a very funny anecdote about his attendance to an NBA event. Don’t miss it!

Question: How did you get into the sports games industry?

Answer: Like most times in life, by chance. Together with two friends, we created a software company, but we developed it at the same time, just for fun, not even as a side project, a fantasy soccer game to play with other friends. We started playing with 32 friends and after two years the game was played by thousands of users worldwide. We negotiated to launch the game with the license of the Spanish TV channel La Sexta and the game was the germ of a spin-off company 100% dedicated to game development.

Q: What is the best part of being a CTO?

A: In a technology firm like this, you can play a role and be heard in almost every area of the company and have a very complete view of the business without neglecting the usual technical challenges of this role (complex architecture designs, site reliability, quality deployments…).

Q: Could you list some leadership tips?

A: Delegate, trust your team, listen to them, change your mind if necessary but don’t change it if you feel you’re right, be empathetic (you’re sometimes on the other side) and, in general, work as you’d like your leader works.

Q: What skills do you look for in the people for your team?

A: Beyond technical skills, I would say empathy, teamwork and self-learning skills, and proactivity (looking for problems to solve, processes and features to improve…).

Q: How do you motivate your team to achieve the best results?

A: Tough question. Beyond congratulations and rewards, perhaps the best way to motivate the team towards the achievement of objectives is to make them feel important in the development and decision-making of the project, and one step further still, to make them feel important and useful in the day-to-day running of the company.

Q: Tell us about a successful result achieved as a team and how did you get it.

A: Every day we solve problems, develop new features, improve processes… and each
of these small or large actions can be considered a success. In a company of this
type, communication, and collaboration between the different departments: art,
support, QA, design, development, systems, marketing …. is the basis of good results.

Q: What do you expect from the future of the industry?

A: If we talk about the development of video games for mobile devices, I’d say a deeper cross-platform integration (even with second-screen games), a gradual move to VR and AR, and eSports growth. What needs to be improved? I would like to reduce and simplify the bureaucracy to meet the strict guidelines of some big players (Apple, Google, Facebook), and, in general, to feel more protected as developers in front of these big companies.

Q: Do you have any idea how many emails you send per day?

A: Not too many, I’m the technical guy, and Slack is the most distracting tool in my case. I’d say 2 or 3 mails on average per day.

Q: What app do you use the most in your daily life?

A: When I’m working: probably Putty, Konsole, or any other console emulator (I know, it’s sad but it’s true). Off-work, I’d say Twitter.

Q: What is the first thing you do when you get home and disconnect from work?

A: I work remotely, so I’m literally ALWAYS at home, but to disconnect from work there’s nothing like some time playing (or screaming) with my kids.

Q: What would you do if you won the lottery?

A: It depends on the prize, of course, but if I win a big big prize, I’d quit my job and spend as much time as I could with my family… And I also would probably try to become a writer.

Q: Tell us something fun about yourself.

A: I was invited to a special NBA event in New Orleans (we were developers of one of their official games) and I was distracted during one of the gala presenter’s speeches but suddenly I heard “[…] please stand up”; as I hadn’t heard the previous part of the speech, I stood up and…. there I was, standing next to people like Hakeem Olajuwon or Julius Erving when the presenter went on to say “… the legendary players of the NBA”. I distinctly remember the look on the faces of my tablemates wondering how it was possible that a guy who was 1,70m tall could be a legendary player in the NBA.