16 ms·
I've been in the game industry going on a decade now and I have zero interest in unionizing. I do not want my future in any way controlled by yet another extern
by hesdeadjim 8y ago
I've been in the game industry going on a decade now and I have zero interest in unionizing. I do not want my future in any way controlled by yet another external entity that I have little control over and promises nebulous results.
As an employer I want to be able to fire toxic or under-performing employees at will without jumping through a hundred hoops to make sure I am not breaking any union rules.
As an employee, I want to be free to negotiate my own wages based on my merit.
If there is one thing I would want a union to do it would be to collectively enforce some kind of profit sharing plan. The interests of the employees and the employer align -- make a great game that sells well. Anything else, no thanks.
- jahaja 8y agoEmphasis on the "As an employer": > I run a very small indie game studio in Boulder, CO.
- hesdeadjim 8y agoI've been an employee for 80% of my game development career.
- jahaja 8y agoDoesn't change the current "conflict-of-interests" situation that I wanted to highlight.
- notSupplied 8y agoHmm, if being in management makes him conflicted from making anti-union statements, does being an employee also conflict someone from making pro-uniom statements?
- JohnJamesRambo 8y agoThese are all very old problems brought up when workers want protection from abusive employers by forming a union and is not unique to the video games industry at all. Even railroads and textile mills didn’t ask their employees to work 80 hour work weeks.
- hesdeadjim 8y agoThere are some serious bad actors in the game industry, Rock Star being one of the worst. Where I've worked we valued work/life balance as much as possible. Did we have a bit of crunch close to a release? Yep, but it was short and a few weeks at max. Most of us enjoyed it due to the extra camaraderie. If there were a unionization effort that focused on 1) a hard 40-50 hour cap on work hours (or with paid overtime) and 2) enforced profit sharing plans, I could support it. The current main unionization effort basically says "things will be better for everyone" on their FAQ. Total bullshit.
- fzeroracer 8y agoSaying that 'most of us enjoyed crunch time' seems like a bit of projection, especially for people that might have families or other social obligations outside of work that crunch time eats into.
- hesdeadjim 8y agoWe were sane about it, family obligations always took priority. There is a difference between a sprint to the end and a death march like Rock Star.
- vvanders 8y agoJust so you know, this is the knife edge that leads you down to crunch. Literally every time I had a 3-4mo 80-100hour crunch it always started out with "we're going to push for a week or two" which just transitioned into "just one more week" for the next 3 months. Also, shame for celebrating a crunch. You may have enjoyed it but there's a high likelyhood someone else went along just to not "rock the boat". I don't care who you are putting in more hours puts stress on other parts of your life. I just don't understand how that industry has their head up their ass from top to bottom for such a long time. There's some interesting problems in that space but after my 6 years I'd never go back.
- 8y ago
- anshou- 8y agoWhat is your role in your organization? Some roles fit better for union support than others, imho.
- hesdeadjim 8y agoPredominantly engineer, but I've been a first employee at a hugely successful game startup and now run my own very small indie game company. I'm intimately familiar with the pros and cons of being on both ends of the equation.
- anth_anm 8y agoBluntly, you are the enemy the unions fight. Your opinion of them is that of someone who is (and should be) threatened by the existence of unions. You're biased.
- pnathan 8y agoPolitely - You're management/executive at this point. It is obviously in your interest to be anti-union. It is also the case that unions serve the interests of those who are not "rock star developers" more than those who are.
- AimForTheBushes 8y agoWorking with toxic or under performing employees is just as bad as having them work for you.
- hesdeadjim 8y agoAbsolutely. And it's morale poison for the rest of the team. I speak from experience.
- xapata 8y agoThen don't let them into the union? Or, alternatively, fire them from the union. A modern union is not restricted to follow the same practices as ones for different times and industries.
- pnathan 8y agoThen the rules for firing toxic and under performing employees can be written into the union contract and how the union conducts its business... This isn't an unreasonable ask, no one is going to want to be saddled with a toxic person they can't get rid of.
- hesdeadjim 8y agoI've been an employee for 80% of my career and from a moral standpoint I believe in treating people fairly. The current unionization efforts provide almost no details on their goals beyond "everything will be better for everyone". On either end of the employee/employer relationship I have a hard time seeing how anyone can support such a generic effort. A hard stance on working conditions and compensation is a starting point for a real conversation. The majority of employees would have no problem supporting this, and since I already value work/life balance and fair compensation, my motives and interests would align.
- MCrekt 8y agoAgreed.
- flausfybea 8y ago> I do not want my future in any way controlled by yet another external entity that I have little control over and promises nebulous results. You mean like.... an employer? > As an employer Ahh.
- amyjess 8y ago> As an employee, I want to be free to negotiate my own wages based on my merit. Two things wrong with this. 1) Professional unions, such as Hollywood and sports unions, do not establish rigid payscales like non-professional unions. They set a salary floor and some basic guidelines for non-salary pay (e.g. residuals are typically mandated). If game developers unionize, the union will likely be a professional union. 2) Salary negotiation is intensely problematic, and many companies are doing away with it, union or no. For example, Reddit a few years ago eliminated negotiation in favor of delivering their best offer from the start. Salary negotiation has sexist biases and rewards people for skills that A) have nothing to do with the skills that are required for the job and B) not everyone qualified for the job possesses. Salary negotiation is about enabling employers to pay employees lower salaries; it benefits the employer entirely and not the employee. And that goes back to pnathan's comment: the whole point of unions is to act in the interest of the employees against the employer, so the whole "as an employer" section is ultimately irrelevant.
- tomc1985 8y agoIs it truly merit, or simply what the market will bear?
- TomMckenny 8y agoWhy would any of those things happen when none of the potential union members want them either? A union is democratic after all and does not automatically have legal agreements with the company or requirements from other employees. No one want's to protect under-performers for whom they'd have to pick up the slack. And no one wants their compensation set arbitrarily. Especially since in software anyone can jump ship and find performance based compensation somewhere else. They just want to work the hours specified in the employment contract rather than being singled out in isolation from each other and required to work far beyond the amount contractually agreed on under threat of termination. So you'd just have a group that discuses abusive uncompensated overtime and request changes in a united way. Because a single person complaining or quitting over mistreatment has zero impact.
- taneq 8y agoHigh-performing, in-demand, highly capable workers have always felt like this. Unions don't benefit you, the way mandatory healthcare doesn't benefit young healthy people.