10 Responses for "EA Employees Unhappy, Attempt Class Action Lawsuit"

1. Scrivs

   November 12th, 2004 at 1:52 pm

   1

   I have to question why these employees didn’t talk to current or former employees of the company before they decided to join. And I mean I have never read an article about the glories of being a videogame programmer. I thought it was common knowledge the pluses and minuses associated with the job.

2. Lea

   November 12th, 2004 at 2:05 pm

   2

   Well, because the opportunity to talk to current or former employees is not as easy to do unless you actually KNOW someone in the company. And when you’re new, they’re not going to talk smack about the company they work for–not until you’ve felt the pain and then the walls crumble and the bitching sessions starts. This is true for ALL industries, not just the gaming industry.

   As for being overworked, underpaid, etc… There’s always going to be plus and minuses to every job, but the point is not to just LEAVE the moment things get rough (it’s like saying you have to immediately move to Canada because you were unhappy with W’s re-election). You want to stay and fix the problem and give it the good ol’ try before/if you go. Relocation, while sounding simple enough, can uproot a lot of people’s lifestyles.

   The problem isn’t people hating the actual tasks of their job–it’s the poor conditions they’re given to do it, plus undercompensating. I don’t know why there’s even arguments against this–employers, bottom line, need to compensate their employees for extra/hard work. Instead of complaining and say it’s an industry problem so they should just suck it up–no, it’s a WORK problem, period, and it needs to be fixed.

   Companies need to get their priorities straight. Employees are their biggest commodity and best investment.

   Take it from Google–apparently it’s like a palace there. Result? Happy employees churning out innovative products and long hours with little complaint. And Google is now a behemoth in tech world.

   Or how about even Costco? A recent business article I read about them stated that the employees were one of the best paid in their type of industry. Costco has also recorded significant gains. Yes, I think there’s a connection.

3. Derek

   November 12th, 2004 at 2:06 pm

   3

   Yeah I’ve always heard of developers working insane hours. And it always seemed like they enjoyed it. And they all make tons of money too, so maybe they should do something else if they want to spend time with their families. Generally making tons of money is not compatible with having tons of family time…

4. Derek

   November 12th, 2004 at 2:10 pm

   4

   A colleague once told me about a friend of his that owned an art gallery. She had great art and a great location, but couldn’t make any money. She sold the business to someone else, only to watch it flourish and make those people tons of money, with the same location, same products, and same staff. She later bought the gallery back, only to see it completely fail again. The only main difference was that she paid the employees $6 an hour, and the other owners paid them $10 an hour.

   Happy employees equal productive employees, I suppose.

5. Nicole

   November 12th, 2004 at 2:10 pm

   5

   I agree Lea. Whenever I come across stories like these, I can’t help but think “Did the company managers miss Business 101?” It’s been proven time and time again that treating employees well lowers turnover while increasing loyalty and creating productive workers. Productive workers means a productive, efficient business (i.e. profits).

   Eventually, EA will feel the burn of treating their employees poorly. It won’t be instantaneous, but it will happen.

6. Lea

   November 12th, 2004 at 2:41 pm

   6

   Nicole–precisely. Well, look at Disney. It’s turned into The Icky Mouse Club. We all grew up with it, loved it, and then suddenly, grew to hate it for several reasons. And I think it stemmed from really bad treatment of employees.

   There’s tons of stories out there about how Disney treated their animators like slaves, and even about blacklisting tactics.

   I mean, doesn’t it say something about the company when giant Disney executives leave and form Dreamworks because even they realised how bad the internal politics and mismanagement was?

   As a result: Disney began to suck and it shows.

7. Me

   November 13th, 2004 at 3:05 pm

   7

   And they all make tons of money

   Hahahahah. I wish that were true. Part of the reason people are bitching is because we’re being worked like dogs AND not getting compensated for it.

   Either give us reasonable hours, or pay us for the time we work. That doesn’t seem like much to ask.

8. andrew

   November 18th, 2004 at 9:24 am

   8

   While there’s a lot of talk about how this isn’t fair to the employees companies like EA seem to be missing something else that’s very integral in their processes and productivity. Right now, they are burning out their trained assets. Imagine all the brains that set up the processes unique to these gaming companies are being burnt out day after day.That EA, and others, don’t protect themselves here I have never understood.
   I used to work for one of these big gaming companies and had to leave. Life is so much nicer.

9. John Doe

   May 19th, 2006 at 5:22 am

   9

   I am currently employed at Electronic Arts in Los Angeles and taken on the role as a Quality Assurance Tester. Let me tell you this, it’s a lot better then other gaming companies in the L.A area, but they work you till you drop. And the funny thing is, lot’s of other testers are trying to move up, but they work you soo hard that you get soo mentally fustrated with the time your there from and the idiots they hire. It’s soo pathetic and I’m getting sick of this, I have a hounding manager who always tells me to get to work if he see’s me walking from the bathroom, and God know’s what he does all day.
   I find major flaws and progression stoppers througout the project, that other people don’t find, but yet I get treated like garbage. When I first started, they asked me if I wanted to move into other fields such as Audio or even Marketing, well it’s my 3rd consecutive term after being laid off before that 12 month maker came and they would have to pay me benefits. Talk about a sweatshop, I get along with everyone but I still can’t get atleast benefits to take care of myself.
   If you know anyone who’s looking for a loyal, dedicated employee, feel free to E-mail me.

10. Dave Schinkel

    August 15th, 2009 at 10:34 pm

    10

    I don’t care if you’re in the video game industry, the search engine industry, or whatever, no company has the right to work their employees till they are sick and treat them as machines, not human beings. That’s bullshit. Even if they do get paid six figures. That’s bullshit.

    Employees need to stand up to this. If managers are slave driving you, then go work somewhere else. Problem is, most IT departments are poorly run by idiots these days who treat employees like dogs by running unrealistic deadlines and code & run process-less environments with no team standards, team collaboration, and a work-life-balance.

    I don’t care if we developers get paid “the big bucks”, there’s is a fine line between # of hours required to get the job done and SANITY that employers need to own up to and clean up their act.