When we (Ensemble) were acquired a few years back, there was basically very little change in our day to day operations.  I was quite afraid at the time that "the man" was going to come in and wreck our awesome high-functioning studio, and fortunately those fears have proven quite unfounded.  Our culture was left more or less completely alone, and we stayed in our cool offices in North Dallas. 

There is, however, another Microsoft office in the area, a much larger branch than Ensemble, that is out in Las Colinas (sort of between Dallas and Fort Worth).  It's a nice complex, they have a nice cafeteria built into the offices, and a convenient company store with lots of Microsoft goodies.  But really, we just don't get out there very much.  Today was an exception for me; recently Redmond rolled out some new high level management policies and all managers (which includes me) had to attend training on it, which was being administered over at the Las Colinas office.  So we all loaded up and invaded the corporate office complex. 

The training itself was, as most corporate training is, 10 minutes of content presented over the course of two hours.  But what I found interesting was just what a different world the "traditional" Microsoft managers lived in compared to our band of rabble-rousers at Ensemble.  I'm quite certain they are effective at their jobs and the environment they promote is the right one for Enterprise Developer Support Communication or whatnot.  But you could just instantly tell the difference between the Ensemble folks and the Las Colinas ones.  It definitely made me think about how lucky I am to be among peers, and how supportive the Ensemble culture is of the odd blend of personalities drawn to game development, and the incredibly flexible approach to technology and art that making games requires. 

Days like today remind me how much I love my job.