competitive esports
League of Legends is a competitive video game where two teams of five players compete against each other with teamwork, quick decision-making, and precise execution being fundamental to success. The game requires excellent communication, adaptability, strategy and discipline over an extended period of time to win.
It can be easy to underestimate the significance of an esports environment. The players representing their team have spent thousands of hours of many years pushing themselves to become better in the hopes of winning the tournaments they compete in. It's a space for ambitious competitive people to try their skills and preparation against other people.
At the beginning of my two year stay as Manager of the UC Davis League of Legends program I inherited a broken and unorganized mess. The program had experienced decline over the last two years when I had been a player on the teams. We faced many challenges including attracting quality players, setting a competitive standard of behavior, and fitting within a league that is structured around a semester system while our university was on a quarter schedule.
To address these problems I took initiative through implementing extensive recruiting operations attracting many new players, training two quality coaches to ensure competitive standards, and implementing a two tryout system that enabled us to adapt to the semester schedule. With a coaching staff leading the way we transformed a dying program into the greatest version of itself yet. We grew to twenty five members representing our University across three teams and found great success in the collegiate circuits we competed in.
During this time I was responsible for coordinating schedules of our teams and representatives of other universities, resolving internal conflicts and competitive issues among team members, and making informed decisions with the goal of cultivating long term growth. Through these trials I refined my leadership, team environment/management, organization, communication, and time management skills.