Women’s History Month — Madbox

We’re now midway into March and this is a month that is very important to us, it’s Women’s History month. Since 1987, it has been celebrated and used as a time to reflect on the contributions that women have made to society. These range from historical events that have shaped our futures, to inventions that changed the lives of billions around the world.

Before we talk about the amazing women that work at Madbox, we should look at the gaming industry as a whole so that everyone has a solid perspective on why we always stand behind our Madboxers.

Gamers have often been portrayed as the stereotypical male living in their mom’s basement. That old mentality has always been disingenuous but since 2010, women easily make up at least 50% of those that play video games. One UK study reported that over 52% of gamers are actually women thus throwing the misconception that men rule the digital world into complete disarray. With that in mind, you’d be led to believe that with such a large interest in gaming from women, that they’d also be represented in positions that are actually making games. Unfortunately, that’s not the case. In France, it’s estimated that there are less than 15% of women who work in the gaming industry.

So what does that mean for Madbox? Diversity. It’s an undervalued word that has a high impact in the ecosystem that is our lives. It’s also key to the success of Madbox. Without it, ideas would fail to flourish and never reach their full potential. We believe that games are representative of the people who create them and when you have diversity, there’s no limit to creativity. That’s why we’ve grown a creative culture driven by diversity so that our games are always designed to be played by everyone, no matter where they come from or who they are.

At Madbox, we have many extremely talented women who come from a wide range of industry backgrounds like computer science, art, engineering, legal and web development. With our ‘thoughtfully candid’ approach to freely and openly providing feedback to each other, we’re always sparking conversations. We even undertake monthly internal weather surveys aimed at gathering sentiment around all things Madbox. This month the ladies of Madbox gave us their thoughts relating to Women’s History month and their insights into our Mad world.

When it comes to office culture and the work environment at Madbox, the big takeaway here was PEOPLE. The collaboration, openness to feedback and the willingness to help others iterate on their ideas all contributed to the positivity they felt in the studios. It’s ingrained in our DNA to put people first.

“What I love most in my job at Madbox is the enthusiasm that everyone brings and the constant strive to better ourselves and work.” — Alize

Discussing achievements, there were many that have moved Madbox forward over the past 2 year. From single handedly managing the entire relocation of the Paris office over the course of the ‘Pandemic Summer’ of 2020, to putting together the complex infrastructure needed to operate data science applications. And that’s just to name a few! The drive to learn and do better is always an aspect of our work ethic that’s clearly reflected in the way Madboxers approach their projects. You can expect de facto ownership of your role when you’re at either our Paris office or working in our Barcelona location. This leads to everyone being able to truly unleash their talents in new and exciting ways.

“Creating a project management website on my own, with lots of complexities that required a huge amount of code. It’s a service used by a lot of madboxers. It was an ambitious project, with many things I didn’t know how to quite do.” — Myriam

Madbox is full of casual people out to achieve with a mad ambition . So naturally, we’d look everywhere for inspiration as even the tiniest amount can be enough to set off an explosion of creativity.

But what is inspiration without the opportunity to truly have an impact within your role? We know that autonomy can lead to mighty moments of creativity that result in creating games that players will love. That’s why it’s part of our pillar of values that every Madboxer is able to make the impact they want with the trust and transparency that we cultivate at Madbox. But it’s also important to remember the women that have made a major difference in our lives during this special month.

We are thankful to all the women out there who stand to make a difference and are proud to be strong! If you’re wanting to make history and create games for millions of players, our team has some wonderful advice to share to all the women out there who may be looking for their start in gaming:

• Be yourself, talk to others and never be sorry to ask about things that you don’t know.
• What matters is what you want to do or be, not what others think of you.
• If you keep trying for what you want to achieve, it will be yours!

Looking to create your story with us? Check out our career page for our open opportunities and come play with us!