Fractional Talent’s Growing Role in Game Development

As studios contend with layoffs, hiring freezes, longer development cycles, and a growing supply of experienced talent outside traditional roles, fractional work is emerging as a potential middle ground between full-time hiring and conventional consulting. Host Devin Becker is joined by Aaron Bush, co-founder and Managing Partner of Naavik, to discuss why the company expanded from research and advisory into fractional talent, what meaningfully separates fractional leadership from contracting or staff augmentation, and how these engagements work in practice.

They examine which roles fit the model, why senior talent dominates the supply pool, how studios retain knowledge after an engagement ends, and whether increased reliance on fractional experts could weaken the industry’s pipeline for developing junior talent. The conversation also considers whether this is a temporary response to the current employment cycle or an early sign of studios becoming smaller permanent teams supported by flexible specialists.

Check out Naavik's Fractional Talent Network: https://naavik.co/fractional-talent/

We’d like to thank Dive for making this episode possible! With its fully managed analytics and LiveOps platform built for game studios, 95% of their clients grow revenue in one year. All of that without having to hire an in-house data team. Learn more here: dive.games/scale

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Sound design by Gavin Mc Cabe.