The problem isn't crunch or stay late, but if you get compensated for it or if its expected that you stay late without pay. Personally, no matter the whole 'creative' or 'my passion', I would want my time to be compensated one way or another for working extra time. Anything else is just exploiting imo.
thats just CA though, right, poop? Not federal or anything?
The case was regarding CA law, I´m not really sure if other states have similar ones, but CA supreme court was as high as it went, not 9th circuit or SC.
Just wondering, either from this discussion or otherwise, has anyone decided they won't work crunch or stay late next time they are asked?
I´ll post an anecdote, but try to keep it intentionally vague so as not to point fingers or burn bridges:
I was working at a studio where my contract said I could be asked for up to 5 hours of unpaid overtime per week. We were nearing the end of the project, and extra time was asked for, so I stayed an hour extra each day. My leads asked me point blank to also come in on the weekend. I simply did not. I didn´t make excuses (nor did I say I would come in), I just didn´t show up. I still got my tasks done by the deadlines however. They confronted me, saying I was making a bad example to the less experienced employees. (always love that guilt line). Whether asked by the leads or not, the other most experienced person in my department asked me why I wasn´t coming in on the weekends, and I explained that it was not in my contract, and if they wanted the extra time, they could pay for it, and that I did not think the tasks left required it, that it was more for appearances sake. He agreed with me, and after that point, he stopped coming in on the weekend days as well.
The fallout, was that both leads tried to imply my work was poor, or I wasn't dedicated enough or some such. I am sure if I had stuck around till my next performance review I'd have to deal with that, but luckily I left before that happened. I was in the position to be able to stand up for myself, but I realize not everyone is, either with too many bills or a non-working spouse or not wanting to move their family and that company being the only studio in town. My personal feeling was that I would rather work at a non game-dev job and get paid per hour, even if the average take home pay was less, than work so long I have no outside life just to work on games for a higher salary. I like spending time with my husband, my dog, reading, cooking, etc.
The time period was about 2-3 months, if I remember correctly.
The problem isn't crunch or stay late, but if you get compensated for it or if its expected that you stay late without pay. Personally, no matter the whole 'creative' or 'my passion', I would want my time to be compensated one way or another for working extra time. Anything else is just exploiting imo.
The problem is, you get asked to work extra when you don't want to.
The reason is, everyone does it when they get asked to so there's no motivation for studios/publishers change.
The solutions are, compensation for overtime to make you want to be there or to not do overtime in the first place.
As an individual the only option you have is to not do it, so was wondering if anyone chosen that solution.
Nice hearing the story Ben, I wonder what happened to the other most experienced person. In my experience there's always been some people who haven't crunched and nothing bad had happened to them in the long run.
What really frustrates me, is that when a studio is asked to crunch, you will normally have 2 groups of people. The largest group will be people who go along with the crunch. Either because they want to, or can´t risk losing the job, or a combo of these two. Then you have a 2nd group who won´t crunch, either they don´t want to work for free, or can´t based on personal obligations. Rather than show solidarity, the first group almost always turns on the 2nd group, at the very least harboring ill feelings. It is rarely "I wish I had the financial security and or confidence to stand up for myself like that person". It is most often, "what an arrogant asshole, or what a non team player".
So not only do you get pressure from your leads/bosses/managers, but the team as well. It makes for a very toxic atmosphere that makes it nearly impossible to stand up for your right to be fairly compensated. Which is *surprise!* the goal of having an unorganized labor pool. (ie, a lack of a union). It benefits the capitalist class, the business owners, the most to have every worker by the financial balls/clitoris.
It's a dangerous game to play the refuse-to-crunch card, esp. for young developers and Ben would *probably* would agree with me on this: this industry is small (and chatty), and your reputation will precede you wherever you go.
Even tossing aside the lead/manager's grumblings, it's easy for the coworkers who DID do the crunch to feel resentful. I'd say it's understandable (although unfortunate) that coworkers would feel like one of their own is opting out, resulting in the rest of them feeling the need to pick up a larger perceived OT workload). Don't get me wrong, I think that this attitude perpetuates the crunch situation, but it is still resent that people might carry with them to other companies.
In other words, your reputation can be held hostage by a coworkers opinion of crunch.
That said, Poop/Ben's pretty seasoned. I'm sure he surveyed his situation (workload/project/funding/and reasons-for-crunch) and wasn't ignorant of this aspect.
I remember hearing from a friend that where he works (AAA game studio) they make him do x amount of overtime a month without pay.
What the flip? Is this normal!? (by his reaction and things said in this topic it seems so)
So they make you work for nothing? or to put it another way, you don't get paid as much as you think because we can add them extra hours to your total hours and dilute your pay down. This is crazy.
Hence those with animosity about shady companies/studios. Nice to see this thread continue, glad to see everyone speaking out. I'm for the people, if we were treated as such then everything would be gravy.
Jessep:
The Truth, you can't handle the truth!
Maybe those in group 1 are unaware of their laws/rights, which would make more sense unless you know group 1 understands the terms in their contracts, I would like to think if they knew more they would eventually side with group 2, maybe that's why these studios are starting to give people the boot, possibly being labeled as, "not a team player" guess who's team your not on..
Are there any guesses among you guys as to how long until the quietly-mumbled discontent bubbles over into some vague form of unionizing/organization?
Seems like it's only a matter of time (though I suspect there could and would be attempts to prolong it as much as possible) before the number of people resisting the exploitation reaches critical mass.
If the manufacturers again decide to do the whole "We can push teh grafix to the max!" marketing nonsense, I can see the ballooning of already-ridiculous expectations (and their accompanying dev-burnout tolls) shortening that timeframe considerably.
I'm really glad I work where I do.
We have most of the kinks worked out of our pipeline and its a well oiled process so we have very little crunch time. It is written into our contracts that when asked we can work up to 10hrs per week of unpaid overtime.
In theory this gets factored into our pay and most of the time we never work even an hour over. So in a way its like we're taking the overtime pay they factor in but never putting in the hours because everyone gets their work done on time.
I have worked at another place (outside of the industry) where overtime was unpaid and weekends where mandatory even at times when there wasn't anything to work on. Even when there was work, everyone was so demoralized that everyone slacked off, their way of passive aggressively standing up to the man without the man ever knowing about it.
I worked at one other place before that where everyone was paid overtime and people would "build their own paychecks" by taking longer to do things and clocking more hours, sometimes just hanging out "after work" for a few hours and then punching out and going home, worse not punching out and coming back later to clock out. It didn't take long for those habits to spread from a few people to a company wide epidemic that had the owner micro managing everyone to stem the tide of overtime and red ink he was bleeding.
My personal philosophy is pretty simple, take care of my bills and I'll take care of your business.
If I'm underpaid and have trouble paying my bills it shifts my focus off of doing the best job that I can. I don't ask for much, I don't have a high maintenance lifestyle and I'm not the type to hang my happiness on my wallet so it doesn't take much to keep me happy and loyal.
What really frustrates me, is that when a studio is asked to crunch, you will normally have 2 groups of people. The largest group will be people who go along with the crunch. Either because they want to, or can´t risk losing the job, or a combo of these two. Then you have a 2nd group who won´t crunch, either they don´t want to work for free, or can´t based on personal obligations. Rather than show solidarity, the first group almost always turns on the 2nd group, at the very least harboring ill feelings. It is rarely "I wish I had the financial security and or confidence to stand up for myself like that person". It is most often, "what an arrogant asshole, or what a non team player".
So not only do you get pressure from your leads/bosses/managers, but the team as well. It makes for a very toxic atmosphere that makes it nearly impossible to stand up for your right to be fairly compensated. Which is *surprise!* the goal of having an unorganized labor pool. (ie, a lack of a union). It benefits the capitalist class, the business owners, the most to have every worker by the financial balls/clitoris.
I hadn't check this thread in a while, but I wanted to pop in and thank you for the awesome posts Ben. You're very much right, a lot of these issues are deeply embedded into the culture of the games industry, and I think changing that is really the first step.
So they make you work for nothing? or to put it another way, you don't get paid as much as you think because we can add them extra hours to your total hours and dilute your pay down. This is crazy.
If you are on salary then you don't usually have a strict limit on hours per week. You are paid a lump sum. Sometimes 40 hours a week, sometimes 80 hours a week.
Advantages of being on salary are sick days and holiday days which are paid.
Contracts will often contain clauses that limit your future legal options to collect additional money. State and provincial governments have also passed laws that exempt high-tech workers from existing labour laws. Example:
http://www.labour.gov.bc.ca/esb/facshts/high_tech.htm Hours of work and overtime
The hours of work provisions of the Act, including those governing meal breaks, split shifts, minimum daily pay and hours free from work each week, as well as the overtime and statutory holiday provisions, do not apply to high technology professionals.
Employees in high technology companies who are not high technology professionals are covered by the hours of work, overtime and statutory holiday provisions of the Act.
Each company is different and can set whatever working conditions they wish within the limits of their local laws.
I worked at one other place before that where everyone was paid overtime and people would "build their own paychecks" by taking longer to do things and clocking more hours, sometimes just hanging out "after work" for a few hours and then punching out and going home, worse not punching out and coming back later to clock out. It didn't take long for those habits to spread from a few people to a company wide epidemic that had the owner micro managing everyone to stem the tide of overtime and red ink he was bleeding.
Thats why in a company that pays overtime you should use an approval system so no unaproved overtime is made/paid.
Replies
The case was regarding CA law, I´m not really sure if other states have similar ones, but CA supreme court was as high as it went, not 9th circuit or SC.
I´ll post an anecdote, but try to keep it intentionally vague so as not to point fingers or burn bridges:
I was working at a studio where my contract said I could be asked for up to 5 hours of unpaid overtime per week. We were nearing the end of the project, and extra time was asked for, so I stayed an hour extra each day. My leads asked me point blank to also come in on the weekend. I simply did not. I didn´t make excuses (nor did I say I would come in), I just didn´t show up. I still got my tasks done by the deadlines however. They confronted me, saying I was making a bad example to the less experienced employees. (always love that guilt line). Whether asked by the leads or not, the other most experienced person in my department asked me why I wasn´t coming in on the weekends, and I explained that it was not in my contract, and if they wanted the extra time, they could pay for it, and that I did not think the tasks left required it, that it was more for appearances sake. He agreed with me, and after that point, he stopped coming in on the weekend days as well.
The fallout, was that both leads tried to imply my work was poor, or I wasn't dedicated enough or some such. I am sure if I had stuck around till my next performance review I'd have to deal with that, but luckily I left before that happened. I was in the position to be able to stand up for myself, but I realize not everyone is, either with too many bills or a non-working spouse or not wanting to move their family and that company being the only studio in town. My personal feeling was that I would rather work at a non game-dev job and get paid per hour, even if the average take home pay was less, than work so long I have no outside life just to work on games for a higher salary. I like spending time with my husband, my dog, reading, cooking, etc.
The time period was about 2-3 months, if I remember correctly.
The problem is, you get asked to work extra when you don't want to.
The reason is, everyone does it when they get asked to so there's no motivation for studios/publishers change.
The solutions are, compensation for overtime to make you want to be there or to not do overtime in the first place.
As an individual the only option you have is to not do it, so was wondering if anyone chosen that solution.
Nice hearing the story Ben, I wonder what happened to the other most experienced person. In my experience there's always been some people who haven't crunched and nothing bad had happened to them in the long run.
So not only do you get pressure from your leads/bosses/managers, but the team as well. It makes for a very toxic atmosphere that makes it nearly impossible to stand up for your right to be fairly compensated. Which is *surprise!* the goal of having an unorganized labor pool. (ie, a lack of a union). It benefits the capitalist class, the business owners, the most to have every worker by the financial balls/clitoris.
Even tossing aside the lead/manager's grumblings, it's easy for the coworkers who DID do the crunch to feel resentful. I'd say it's understandable (although unfortunate) that coworkers would feel like one of their own is opting out, resulting in the rest of them feeling the need to pick up a larger perceived OT workload). Don't get me wrong, I think that this attitude perpetuates the crunch situation, but it is still resent that people might carry with them to other companies.
In other words, your reputation can be held hostage by a coworkers opinion of crunch.
That said, Poop/Ben's pretty seasoned. I'm sure he surveyed his situation (workload/project/funding/and reasons-for-crunch) and wasn't ignorant of this aspect.
What the flip? Is this normal!? (by his reaction and things said in this topic it seems so)
So they make you work for nothing? or to put it another way, you don't get paid as much as you think because we can add them extra hours to your total hours and dilute your pay down. This is crazy.
what a shitty thing to do to people
Hence those with animosity about shady companies/studios. Nice to see this thread continue, glad to see everyone speaking out. I'm for the people, if we were treated as such then everything would be gravy.
Maybe those in group 1 are unaware of their laws/rights, which would make more sense unless you know group 1 understands the terms in their contracts, I would like to think if they knew more they would eventually side with group 2, maybe that's why these studios are starting to give people the boot, possibly being labeled as, "not a team player" guess who's team your not on..
Seems like it's only a matter of time (though I suspect there could and would be attempts to prolong it as much as possible) before the number of people resisting the exploitation reaches critical mass.
If the manufacturers again decide to do the whole "We can push teh grafix to the max!" marketing nonsense, I can see the ballooning of already-ridiculous expectations (and their accompanying dev-burnout tolls) shortening that timeframe considerably.
We have most of the kinks worked out of our pipeline and its a well oiled process so we have very little crunch time. It is written into our contracts that when asked we can work up to 10hrs per week of unpaid overtime.
In theory this gets factored into our pay and most of the time we never work even an hour over. So in a way its like we're taking the overtime pay they factor in but never putting in the hours because everyone gets their work done on time.
I have worked at another place (outside of the industry) where overtime was unpaid and weekends where mandatory even at times when there wasn't anything to work on. Even when there was work, everyone was so demoralized that everyone slacked off, their way of passive aggressively standing up to the man without the man ever knowing about it.
I worked at one other place before that where everyone was paid overtime and people would "build their own paychecks" by taking longer to do things and clocking more hours, sometimes just hanging out "after work" for a few hours and then punching out and going home, worse not punching out and coming back later to clock out. It didn't take long for those habits to spread from a few people to a company wide epidemic that had the owner micro managing everyone to stem the tide of overtime and red ink he was bleeding.
My personal philosophy is pretty simple, take care of my bills and I'll take care of your business.
If I'm underpaid and have trouble paying my bills it shifts my focus off of doing the best job that I can. I don't ask for much, I don't have a high maintenance lifestyle and I'm not the type to hang my happiness on my wallet so it doesn't take much to keep me happy and loyal.
I hadn't check this thread in a while, but I wanted to pop in and thank you for the awesome posts Ben. You're very much right, a lot of these issues are deeply embedded into the culture of the games industry, and I think changing that is really the first step.
If you are on salary then you don't usually have a strict limit on hours per week. You are paid a lump sum. Sometimes 40 hours a week, sometimes 80 hours a week.
Advantages of being on salary are sick days and holiday days which are paid.
Contracts will often contain clauses that limit your future legal options to collect additional money. State and provincial governments have also passed laws that exempt high-tech workers from existing labour laws. Example:
Each company is different and can set whatever working conditions they wish within the limits of their local laws.
Thats why in a company that pays overtime you should use an approval system so no unaproved overtime is made/paid.
http://www.polygon.com/features/2013/10/23/4817662/pid-might-and-delight-crunch
god i hate crunch.