Michael Bybee Email & Phone Number

Mission Viejo, Ca, Us

Irvine, Ca, Us

I currently lead a team of more than 50 producers collectively responsible for all aspects of World of Warcraft Modern and Classic as well as Warcraft RTS. I also manage teamwide resourcing, coordinate companywide initiatives with our team, and serve as a spokesperson for Blizzard Entertainment.

Irvine, Ca, Us

I joined Diablo IV as it was shifting from pre-production into full production. My early responsibilities included driving the hero, monster, and NPC pipelines, but within months of joining the team I was given production ownership for all Art departments, including Environment, Lighting, Animation, Characters, and Tech Art. Soon after that, my responsibilities expanded again as I was promoted from Lead Producer to Associate Production Director.In all, I managed up to 18 producers collectively responsible for all Diablo IV game content, including all story, characters, worldbuilding, dungeon, and audio aspects of the game as well as thousands of art assets outsourced to studios all over the world. As Diablo IV shifted into full production, I worked with other leaders to manage the explosive growth of the team from 180 on-site developers in Irvine to more than 500 developers worldwide (not including co-dev or outsourced talent). I also coached new production leadership talent, ultimately promoting four new managers (all from underrepresented groups!). I am particularly proud of our accomplishments in revamping production planning and reporting to focus on data-driven decision making and predictive data modeling.

Irvine, Ca, Us

I was the sole producer for an ambitious incubation project (16 developers). I handled all aspects of production, from day-to-day tasking through long-term planning, and I also partnered with the Game Director, Art Director, and Engineering Lead to manage the team, set strategic priorities, and plan personnel. Although our early game concepts exceeded internal goals, we were forced to cancel further development after losing a key team member.

Irvine, Ca, Us

My first responsibility on World of Warcraft was the User Interface engineering and design team; however, I soon picked up game design features to help ship the Legion expansion. My responsibilities continued to expand until I was producing features, discipline teams, and entire releases.Over the course of my time on WoW, I was responsible for production of the following teams and features:> Shadowlands: New Player Experience, Level Squish, and “Chromie Time”> Battle for Azeroth: Itemization, Dungeon Design, Warfronts, and Patch 8.3, “Visions of N’Zoth”.> Legion: User Interface, Mythic+ system, Order Hall Campaign, Missions feature, and Patch 7.3, “Shadows of Argus”.During this time, I began representing the company as a public spokesperson, participating in press events, public announcements, and interviews by various outlets in print, web, and televised media across several of our worldwide markets. I also started to conduct training workshops for other producers and project managers within the company, and I received a Commit to Quality award in 2017 from Blizzard Quality Assurance for "tireless effort to improve the quality of World of Warcraft" (this award was rarely given to someone outside the QA department).One thing I'm particularly proud of: I worked with design leadership to research and pitch a suite of projects for Shadowlands to improve the experience of new players. This effort resulted in major improvements like a Recruit-a-Friend update, the Party Sync system, and the Level Squish as well as the New Player zone and dungeon. I directly produced a couple of these projects, but most were handed off to other producers as I began transitioning to a new game.

Irvine, Ca, Us

I joined Creative Development to be more involved with projects I was personally excited about. In my first role, I handled line production for Blizzard's physical and digital archives as well as art displays at BlizzCon and other venues. During this time, I led multiple projects to set up Blizzard art exhibits in museums around the world, including the Museum of Contemporary Art in Taipei, the Australian Centre for the Moving Image, and the Smithsonian American Art Museum. After a round of layoffs, I managed the team directly for more than a year, after which I was presented with the “Activision Blizzard CEO Recognition Award” for improving the team’s morale and performance.After I was promoted, I became responsible for all projects in the department. In this capacity, I supervised several teams of up to 9 direct reports who together managed more than 200 animation, illustration, publishing, and sculpture projects to promote various games at Blizzard. During this time, I handled a major transition in senior leadership, which required working out new operating procedures across several departments, temporarily taking over the budget of a departing leader, and resolving employee concerns with the changes. I was also directly responsible for production of some of very exciting projects, including the 16-foot bronze statue of Arthas installed in Taiwan, the first Warcraft Chronicle book, and story development on the Lords of War animated series.

Irvine, Ca, Us

I managed a portfolio of more than 100 external game infrastructure and internal IT projects, ensuring each was properly resourced, scheduled, and implemented. Among these, I worked with engineering leadership to establish rigorous new processes for IT setup at BlizzCon, enabling more than 1,800 computers and supporting infrastructure to be reliably built out in two days. I also spearheaded installation of Voice Over IP technology at Blizzard call centers in 4 countries, resulting in substantial cost savings over the previous traditional telecom system.

I changed contracts to move into a larger supervisory role where I managed a multi-disciplinary team that provided IT systems support, bug tracking, contract management, process improvement, and technical writing to win and maintain compliance for a multi-million dollar contract for the Marine Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle.

I was promoted into a supervisory role over the technical writing team. I led three technical writers to partner with engineering and process improvement personnel to write, illustrate, edit, and test more than 50 technical manuals for Air Force hardware and software systems.

Master Of Business Administration - Mba, Entertainment & Global Management

Bachelor Of Arts - Ba, English, Professional & Technical Writing Emphasis