Development Director - EA Sports FC

Electronic Arts creates next-level entertainment experiences that inspire players and fans around the world. Here, everyone is part of the story. Part of a community that connects across the globe. A place where creativity thrives, new perspectives are invited, and ideas matter. A team where everyone makes play happen.

As a Development Director, EA SPORTS FC Gameplay, you will lead a multidisciplinary team responsible for delivering key areas of the on-pitch experience in EA SPORTS FC.

Responsibilities

• Lead a multidisciplinary Gameplay team that includes employees from Engineering, Animation, and Game Design.
• Manage the performance, development, engagement, and day-to-day experience of your direct reports, including setting expectations, providing feedback, supporting career growth, and addressing performance concerns.
• Partner with Engineering, Animation, and Game Design discipline leaders to align on employee development, craft expectations, staffing needs, and longer-term capability building.
• Own the planning and delivery outcomes for your assigned Gameplay area, ensuring that scope, capacity, priorities, quality, and execution are aligned with product and franchise objectives.
• Translate creative and technical goals into clear, achievable development plans with defined milestones, dependencies, ownership, and success criteria.
• Partner with Gameplay Producers, Designers, Technical Directors, Animation Directors, and Quality Verification leaders to establish priorities and maintain alignment across disciplines.
• Balance the needs of current-title support, future releases, and longer-term Gameplay initiatives, identifying trade-offs when available capacity does not support the full scope of work.
• Monitor team health and delivery performance, proactively identifying risks related to staffing, workload, dependencies, quality, decision-making, or execution.
• Lead milestone planning and readiness activities, maintaining visibility into feature completion, tuning, defect trends, validation plans, dependencies, and ship risks.
• Use player feedback, telemetry, playtesting insights, quality data, and team input to support prioritization and development decisions.
• Lead cross-functional initiatives that require coordination across Gameplay teams, partner organizations, studios, or disciplines.
• Establish and improve team operating practices, including planning, status reporting, risk management, dependency tracking, decision-making, and development reviews.
• Provide clear and concise updates to Gameplay leadership on progress, risks, mitigation plans, staffing needs, and decisions requiring support.
• Foster a culture of accountability, collaboration, inclusion, transparency, constructive feedback, and continuous improvement.
• Support workforce planning, hiring, onboarding, succession planning, and organizational changes within your area.
• Balance strategic planning with hands-on leadership, personally driving critical initiatives and helping the team resolve complex delivery or people challenges when needed.

Experience

• 8+ years of experience in game development, software development, production, project leadership, or a related field, including experience leading complex teams or programs.
• Experience directly managing employees, including goal setting, coaching, career development, performance assessment, and managing performance concerns.
• Experience leading multidisciplinary teams that include two or more of Engineering, Animation, Game Design, Production, or Quality Verification.
• Strong understanding of the game development lifecycle and the collaboration required to deliver player-facing features, systems, content, and technology.
• Proven ability to manage scope, capacity, schedules, dependencies, quality, and risk across multiple workstreams.
• Experience translating creative or technical objectives into structured and achievable execution plans.
• Demonstrated ability to build effective teams, improve ways of working, and create clarity in complex or ambiguous environments.
• Experience driving outcomes in a matrixed organization through influence, collaboration, and stakeholder alignment.
• Strong judgment and problem-solving skills, with the ability to balance product, delivery, people, and organizational considerations.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to facilitate difficult conversations and communicate effectively with senior leaders.
• Working knowledge of Agile, Lean, or other iterative game-development and continuous-improvement practices.

Compensation and Benefits

The ranges listed below are what EA in good faith expects to pay applicants for this role in these locations at the time of this posting. If you reside in a different location, a recruiter will advise on the applicable range and benefits. Pay offered will be determined based on a number of relevant business and candidate factors (e.g. education, qualifications, certifications, experience, skills, geographic location, or business needs).

PAY RANGES \* British Columbia (depending on location e.g. Vancouver vs. Victoria) $122,300 - $170,700 CAD

Pay is just one part of the overall compensation at EA.

For Canada, we offer a package of benefits including vacation (3 weeks per year to start), 10 days per year of sick time, paid top-up to EI/QPIP benefits up to 100% of base salary when you welcome a new child (12 weeks for maternity, and 4 weeks for parental/adoption leave), extended health/dental/vision coverage, life insurance, disability insurance, retirement plan to regular full-time employees. Certain roles may also be eligible for bonus and other incentive programs.