Culture, Innovation & Program Leadership

Turning a leadership vision
into a 5-season innovation engine.

SYSrupt is Light & Wonder's internal hackathon, leadership hands participants real product problem statements, teams get 6 weeks to build an MVP, and the strongest ideas get scored, refined, and in many cases, patented. I operationalized that vision into a sustained, recurring program and owned its creative and participant experience end to end, every season.

RoleProgram Lead, Creative & Experience
Span5 seasons, 2021–2025
CollaboratorsGraphic designer, technical writer
2-minute read
Problem
Leadership wanted a recurring hackathon, but one-off events lose momentum fast.
Approach
Turned the concept into a structured, repeatable program with its own creative identity.
Execution
Owned the full creative and participant experience, teasers, phases, prizes, felicitation, every season.
Result
5 consecutive seasons, 1,123+ participant entries, and 20+ patents filed collectively.
Why This Program Matters

A hackathon is easy to launch, hard to sustain

The mechanics of a hackathon are simple. Keeping people showing up, season after season, is the actual problem.

01

Leadership had real problem statements but no structured way to crowdsource solutions from employees

02

One-off hackathons fade, without a repeatable format, momentum doesn't carry to a second year

03

Without a strong creative identity, energy and participation drop once the novelty wears off

04

Innovation output needs a real path to business value, not demos that go nowhere afterward

Program Growth

Five seasons, tracked the same way every time

Consistent metrics season over season, participants, teams, challenges, and representation, gave leadership a clear read on program health year to year.

Season 1 recap infographic
SEASON 1 · 2021
Season 2 recap infographic
SEASON 2 · 2022
Season 3 recap infographic
SEASON 3
Season 4 recap infographic
SEASON 4 · 2024
Season 5 recap infographic
SEASON 5 · 2025
5
Consecutive seasons run
1,123+
Participant entries across all seasons
142
Teams formed across all seasons
20+
Patents filed collectively
Creative Execution

The season 4 journey, in the creative that carried it

A representative slice of the full-funnel campaign, announcement, registration urgency, phase check-ins, and the finale, all written and designed in-house with a graphic designer and technical writer.

Announce

"Stay tuned"

Sets the tone before registration even opens, builds anticipation off the back of the previous season's success.

Register

"Tick-tock! Time is running out"

Prize amounts made visible upfront alongside the countdown, giving people a concrete reason to register before the deadline.

Build

"It's Design Time!"

Each build phase got its own check-in banner, keeping teams oriented across the 6-week build window, not just at kickoff and demo day.

Finale

"Who is the Winner?"

Builds toward demo day itself, the moment teams' 6 weeks of work gets judged live by leadership panelists.

Recognize

Prize winners announced

Closing the loop publicly, recognition mattered as much as the prize money for keeping the culture of participation alive.

The Approach

Operationalizing a vision into a repeatable program

Structure

Turned a leadership concept into a repeatable format

Gave the program a consistent phased journey, Ideate, Collaborate, Design, Prototype, Test, Iterate, Demo, so every season ran on the same reliable spine, regardless of that year's specific challenges.

Campaign

Ran the full creative campaign, every season

Owned pre-event hype, registration urgency, in-flight phase check-ins, and recap content each season, working with a graphic designer and technical writer to keep the identity consistent and fresh at once.

Experience

Made participation feel valued, not just judged

Arranged swag, certificates, and prize logistics, and helped run the felicitation moments that turned a scoring exercise into a genuine culture of innovation.

Convert

Connected demos to a real path to patents

Coordinated with the Legal/Patent team, who reviewed demo recordings and transcripts each season to identify patent-worthy ideas, with 20+ patents filed collectively across all seasons, awarded jointly to the participating teams.

Ripple effect

Other business units within the company saw SYSrupt's success and started running their own hackathons modeled on it, the format outgrew its original scope and became a reference point across the organization.