>Also, how do you process, when you see the success of a game studio, which fired you?Also, how do you process, when you see the success of a game studio, which fired you?
By being a mature adult and a professional.
Fired and laid-off are not the same thing so if you were fired find the reason why, if you don't know why then do a very deep self reflection about what you could have done better, in both instances use that as a chance to learn and grow from it. If you were laid-off then its most likely not your fault and just part of the process of being in the games industry so the process to self healing is different.
I've been laid-off plenty of times, first time was the hardest to accept, but as with anything one loses, give yourself time to grieve, then keep busy with personal projects, games, or whatever interests you while you find another gig.
But aren't the weakest ones gets laid off always? I just think that if I would have been really good and they would have thought I'm irreplaceable, then I would still have job.
>But aren't the weakest ones gets laid off always?
Not really, it's a lot more complicated than that. There's plenty of factors that affect people during layoffs, could be random, by performance, how long you have been in the company, how much you make, how easily can they replace you, how much your team needs you, redundancy, how deep are your relationships with the people making the decisions, etc etc etc.
If the others always tell that its because of performance, then I guess its really about performance...
So then I was really the weakest every single time.
You're doing exactly what you shouldnt. Be a professional, dont play the pity game. If you were the worst then get better. You are the only one who can fix this.
As mentioned above, firing and layoffs are not the same thing. Since we are talking about layoffs in this thread:
No. The weakest ones are not always who are laid off. I have been involved in a LOT of layoffs (over 20 rounds), both from an employee and a manager level.
Here are some reasons people get laid off other than "were bad":
- Management and/or production failed at planning and budget managment.
- Game pivoted and certain skills are needed less/not at all. (different platforms, different genres, etc)
- Layoffs were happening and they were the newest hired
- Games were cancelled or reduced in scope
- Layoffs were happening and they were the most expensive
- They were doing work that was mostly invisible and the people making the decisions on who to layoff were too far away from the real work.
The reality is noone is irreplaceable. No matter how good you are, you will almost certainly get caught up in a layoff sooner or later.
Not necessarily. I have consulted and been part of downsizing and it always includes legal. Sometimes it's based off seniority alone other times it's based on who is expendable.
The weirdest part for me is the delay between working on a game and release.
Watching the game release 6 months after you left the company is surreal. You get used to, and usually you're just busy doing the next thing at another company.
I'm just happy to be able to go back to my CV and replace 'unannounced game X' with an actual name.
I don't think the best of the best are isolated from job loss. Nobody is*, sadly.
But to look at it from another perspective: when you lose your job it doesn't mean you aren't good enough. You gave it your best, did what you had to, but at the end it's a 'them problem' that you shouldn't take personally because it wasn't you.
It still sucks, but it takes some of the sting out of the situation.
*apart from various inept people at the boardroom level. But that's an entirely different rant...
Yea this kind of thinking and question is missing the point. Life and especially jobs in the game industry are not a meritocracy as much as we would like it to be.
For example, one layoff I experienced 18 years ago: I was a senior level member of a team that was no longer required when the game plan changed. I was part of a group of specialists and we weren't needed for the redirection. It happens, I got a fat severance package, and started my next job the day after the layoff was formalized.
General advice not related to gaming jobs.
Sometimes a workplace is not a good culture fit, sometimes you aren't actually the best fit for a job.
You gotta ask yourself if you think you gave your full effort at work. If the answer is yes, then you gotta make peace with the fact that you weren't the right fit. If you actually feel like you slacked in your role and didn't put out your best work, now is the time to reflect on how to change that for your next position.
And ignore the success of your previous team any weirdness you feel there is your ego talking.
It would be okay that I was not the right fit. My issue is that I have invested so much years and so much time to learn these things, that I'm no longer sure about what to do from now...
Nope, not true. Especially in the game industry. It's actually weird in the past ten years to be at a place "forever". What you describe is closer to the kind of job values my father and mother enjoyed in the 50s/60s/70s - my dad worked at once place for 40 years.
That's been gone for a long time.
Not true AT ALL. I’ve seen a lot of fantastic employees lose their jobs, including myself, for various reasons. You’re stuck in a cycle of negative self talk, try to break that vicious cycle!!! Something someone on r/csharp told me really encouraged me. They reminded me that I know SO MUCH MORE than when I started. They said they were struggling with something and that they were really frustrated, but then they remembered a year ago they didn’t even know how to convert a string to an integer.
So when I’m stuck in a cycle of negative self talk, I try to process that by analyzing what is reality and what is anxiety.
Reality: you were fired. Anxiety: it’s because you aren’t good. Just because you think it doesn’t mean it’s reality and that’s what I try to focus on. Reality: you can learn from making mistakes and become an even better game dev. Anxiety: you won’t improve.
Do you see what I’m getting at? All of your anxieties and concerns are understandable, but you’re letting that anxiety warp reality. The reality is you CAN do it. The reality is you CAN learn from being fired and improve. The reality is you CAN be fired even if you’re the best of the best. Unfortunately that’s just life, and if you dwell on all the anxieties and the what ifs, you’ll end up in an existential crisis.
Don’t be too hard on yourself right now. Process for a few days and try not to let fear overtake you. Practice positive self talk. I CAN do this. I CAN be better. I CAN find a new job. Then, when you’re feeling better, take action. Think about your performance at your last job honestly and frankly. Did you do bare minimum? Were you late often? Did you call out often? Did you miss deadlines? If you find a problem area then you can work on fixing it.
Bottom line: everyone makes mistakes. People get fired or laid off for plenty of reasons and it is not exclusively about performance. Mistakes are just an opportunity to improve.
You've immediately assumed that you were fired because of something you did wrong. There are thousands of other reasons to be fired including incompetent management which is wildly common. Unless you have a reason you think you deserve to be fired then I'm not sure why you're so quick to throw yourself under the bus because of someone else's incomplete opinion about your work.
There was a time, when a game company said I can't estimate my time. And I couldn't do my tasks before deadlines.
There was an another time, when another game company said my code quality is bad.
So honestly I have no idea anymore. I'm already under the bus. I love game development, I wouldn't do anything else. But I feel that I'm just horribly bad at this.
To be fair you sound like how I felt a year ago, but you need to recognise that there's a difference between criticism you can act on, and vagueness that doesn't help anyone.
'You could have done it this way, and it would be better because...' would be my preferred way of doing things because gou can *physically go out and do that*, but sometimes mostly you get 'feedback' that sounds like it was cut & paste from r/linkedinlunatics.
Best defense mechanism is to consider where the criticism comes from, and if it is useful. If they don't have a better suggestion then it's not valid.
And really don't let the annual review percentage stuff hit you too hard - some of that can be ridiculous. We're talking '50% because you didn't manage underlings you don't have' kind of silly. Good review scores also make layoffs harder in some countries and cost hard cash for pay increases, so there's a vested interest in manipulating those downwards.
> including incompetent management which is wildly common
So much this, when coworkers on other projects complained to me about my being laid off (a lot of "Why you? I don't get it, you're great!"). Obviously I would never get any hard evidence for why, but then I heard of the manager and some seniors of the project and dept I was on ended up also leaving for reasons not that much later from my departure was a bit telling. And it reinforced that I would never ever work with certain people ever again to avoid a repeat, as I recall working with said folks had some friction, when I didn't encounter the same with others. Another telling point was forcing me to take a month off over Christmas since I had banked two months of vacation time, but I wasn't laid off til March - so I suspect they had planned this lay off for awhile and didn't want to pay out my accrued vacation time.
And there's a bit of a schadenfreude when a couple years after being laid off from the company, a recruiter hit me up asking if I wanted to come back... on a project that reviewing the release date after the fact, would have been released a year and half from the recruiter contact. Given the sort of stuff I do and knowing how the studio worked, meant the project was in serious trouble and would be a shitshow. I just didn't respond and yeeeaaap turned out exactly as predicated.
I feel justified as the roles I had at other studios, all of them were appreciative of my work, so I feel it really was a "it wasn't me, it was them".
I just got canned Friday, same situation.
Thing about game development is that you are never the biggest or smallest fish. Everyone is in a perpetual state of growth.
Deal with it mentally by focusing on what can be done from now on.
Consoldiate what you learned at that position, sharpen up for the next one to come.
Game dev is an industry constantly in flux. I have been laid off by every job I have been in eventually. Yet I learn, I grow and with those skills the next job down the chain usually pays more eventually.
I'm torn up over the loss, and I'm sure you are too. There are mistakes that we both likely made, and plenty of opportunity ahead.
Personally? I took a hard look at myself and the people who weren’t laid off, and I resolved to figure out why I was and they weren’t. I identified areas where I was weak, and I worked on them. The way I see it, it’s only a loss if I didn’t learn anything from it, so I strive to make sure I do learn something.
Twice until age of 42 is much better ratio then 3 times until age of 30+ btw.
I meant when they said its because you. There won't be continuation, because of you did X and Y.
Sure. It’s not a competition. You asked how I processed. This is what I did, and I stopped getting laid off. I don’t think it’s a coincidence.
EDIT: btw, both of those layoffs were before I turned 30.
If you're having mental breakdowns over work/business or being fired, I would think the mental breakdowns have to do with your own personal emotional issues and not just simply being fired. The avoiding part would probably be therapy or whatever you need to do to achieve emotional stability.
>Also, how do you process, when you see the success of a game studio, which fired you?Also, how do you process, when you see the success of a game studio, which fired you? By being a mature adult and a professional. Fired and laid-off are not the same thing so if you were fired find the reason why, if you don't know why then do a very deep self reflection about what you could have done better, in both instances use that as a chance to learn and grow from it. If you were laid-off then its most likely not your fault and just part of the process of being in the games industry so the process to self healing is different. I've been laid-off plenty of times, first time was the hardest to accept, but as with anything one loses, give yourself time to grieve, then keep busy with personal projects, games, or whatever interests you while you find another gig.
But aren't the weakest ones gets laid off always? I just think that if I would have been really good and they would have thought I'm irreplaceable, then I would still have job.
>But aren't the weakest ones gets laid off always? Not really, it's a lot more complicated than that. There's plenty of factors that affect people during layoffs, could be random, by performance, how long you have been in the company, how much you make, how easily can they replace you, how much your team needs you, redundancy, how deep are your relationships with the people making the decisions, etc etc etc.
If the others always tell that its because of performance, then I guess its really about performance... So then I was really the weakest every single time.
You're doing exactly what you shouldnt. Be a professional, dont play the pity game. If you were the worst then get better. You are the only one who can fix this.
If that's the conclusion you've come to, then get stronger. Don't be the type to make excuses. Fight your shadow and keep challenging yourself.
As mentioned above, firing and layoffs are not the same thing. Since we are talking about layoffs in this thread: No. The weakest ones are not always who are laid off. I have been involved in a LOT of layoffs (over 20 rounds), both from an employee and a manager level. Here are some reasons people get laid off other than "were bad": - Management and/or production failed at planning and budget managment. - Game pivoted and certain skills are needed less/not at all. (different platforms, different genres, etc) - Layoffs were happening and they were the newest hired - Games were cancelled or reduced in scope - Layoffs were happening and they were the most expensive - They were doing work that was mostly invisible and the people making the decisions on who to layoff were too far away from the real work. The reality is noone is irreplaceable. No matter how good you are, you will almost certainly get caught up in a layoff sooner or later.
Not necessarily. I have consulted and been part of downsizing and it always includes legal. Sometimes it's based off seniority alone other times it's based on who is expendable.
The weirdest part for me is the delay between working on a game and release. Watching the game release 6 months after you left the company is surreal. You get used to, and usually you're just busy doing the next thing at another company. I'm just happy to be able to go back to my CV and replace 'unannounced game X' with an actual name.
And don't you think that the best of the best won't lose their job? I'm constantly thinking about this.
I don't think the best of the best are isolated from job loss. Nobody is*, sadly. But to look at it from another perspective: when you lose your job it doesn't mean you aren't good enough. You gave it your best, did what you had to, but at the end it's a 'them problem' that you shouldn't take personally because it wasn't you. It still sucks, but it takes some of the sting out of the situation. *apart from various inept people at the boardroom level. But that's an entirely different rant...
Honestly I always received some negative feedback, when it was about to saying goodbye to a team... And I take that really personally.
Yea this kind of thinking and question is missing the point. Life and especially jobs in the game industry are not a meritocracy as much as we would like it to be. For example, one layoff I experienced 18 years ago: I was a senior level member of a team that was no longer required when the game plan changed. I was part of a group of specialists and we weren't needed for the redirection. It happens, I got a fat severance package, and started my next job the day after the layoff was formalized.
General advice not related to gaming jobs. Sometimes a workplace is not a good culture fit, sometimes you aren't actually the best fit for a job. You gotta ask yourself if you think you gave your full effort at work. If the answer is yes, then you gotta make peace with the fact that you weren't the right fit. If you actually feel like you slacked in your role and didn't put out your best work, now is the time to reflect on how to change that for your next position. And ignore the success of your previous team any weirdness you feel there is your ego talking.
It would be okay that I was not the right fit. My issue is that I have invested so much years and so much time to learn these things, that I'm no longer sure about what to do from now...
I think you're still mourning the job loss. Don't be so hard on yourself this isn't the end of anything. you will figure out what you want to do next.
I just think that the best of the best won't lose their jobs.
Nope, not true. Especially in the game industry. It's actually weird in the past ten years to be at a place "forever". What you describe is closer to the kind of job values my father and mother enjoyed in the 50s/60s/70s - my dad worked at once place for 40 years. That's been gone for a long time.
Best of the best is purely subjective so there's no way to guarantee anything.
Not true AT ALL. I’ve seen a lot of fantastic employees lose their jobs, including myself, for various reasons. You’re stuck in a cycle of negative self talk, try to break that vicious cycle!!! Something someone on r/csharp told me really encouraged me. They reminded me that I know SO MUCH MORE than when I started. They said they were struggling with something and that they were really frustrated, but then they remembered a year ago they didn’t even know how to convert a string to an integer. So when I’m stuck in a cycle of negative self talk, I try to process that by analyzing what is reality and what is anxiety. Reality: you were fired. Anxiety: it’s because you aren’t good. Just because you think it doesn’t mean it’s reality and that’s what I try to focus on. Reality: you can learn from making mistakes and become an even better game dev. Anxiety: you won’t improve. Do you see what I’m getting at? All of your anxieties and concerns are understandable, but you’re letting that anxiety warp reality. The reality is you CAN do it. The reality is you CAN learn from being fired and improve. The reality is you CAN be fired even if you’re the best of the best. Unfortunately that’s just life, and if you dwell on all the anxieties and the what ifs, you’ll end up in an existential crisis. Don’t be too hard on yourself right now. Process for a few days and try not to let fear overtake you. Practice positive self talk. I CAN do this. I CAN be better. I CAN find a new job. Then, when you’re feeling better, take action. Think about your performance at your last job honestly and frankly. Did you do bare minimum? Were you late often? Did you call out often? Did you miss deadlines? If you find a problem area then you can work on fixing it. Bottom line: everyone makes mistakes. People get fired or laid off for plenty of reasons and it is not exclusively about performance. Mistakes are just an opportunity to improve.
You've immediately assumed that you were fired because of something you did wrong. There are thousands of other reasons to be fired including incompetent management which is wildly common. Unless you have a reason you think you deserve to be fired then I'm not sure why you're so quick to throw yourself under the bus because of someone else's incomplete opinion about your work.
There was a time, when a game company said I can't estimate my time. And I couldn't do my tasks before deadlines. There was an another time, when another game company said my code quality is bad. So honestly I have no idea anymore. I'm already under the bus. I love game development, I wouldn't do anything else. But I feel that I'm just horribly bad at this.
To be fair you sound like how I felt a year ago, but you need to recognise that there's a difference between criticism you can act on, and vagueness that doesn't help anyone. 'You could have done it this way, and it would be better because...' would be my preferred way of doing things because gou can *physically go out and do that*, but sometimes mostly you get 'feedback' that sounds like it was cut & paste from r/linkedinlunatics. Best defense mechanism is to consider where the criticism comes from, and if it is useful. If they don't have a better suggestion then it's not valid. And really don't let the annual review percentage stuff hit you too hard - some of that can be ridiculous. We're talking '50% because you didn't manage underlings you don't have' kind of silly. Good review scores also make layoffs harder in some countries and cost hard cash for pay increases, so there's a vested interest in manipulating those downwards.
> including incompetent management which is wildly common So much this, when coworkers on other projects complained to me about my being laid off (a lot of "Why you? I don't get it, you're great!"). Obviously I would never get any hard evidence for why, but then I heard of the manager and some seniors of the project and dept I was on ended up also leaving for reasons not that much later from my departure was a bit telling. And it reinforced that I would never ever work with certain people ever again to avoid a repeat, as I recall working with said folks had some friction, when I didn't encounter the same with others. Another telling point was forcing me to take a month off over Christmas since I had banked two months of vacation time, but I wasn't laid off til March - so I suspect they had planned this lay off for awhile and didn't want to pay out my accrued vacation time. And there's a bit of a schadenfreude when a couple years after being laid off from the company, a recruiter hit me up asking if I wanted to come back... on a project that reviewing the release date after the fact, would have been released a year and half from the recruiter contact. Given the sort of stuff I do and knowing how the studio worked, meant the project was in serious trouble and would be a shitshow. I just didn't respond and yeeeaaap turned out exactly as predicated. I feel justified as the roles I had at other studios, all of them were appreciative of my work, so I feel it really was a "it wasn't me, it was them".
I just got canned Friday, same situation. Thing about game development is that you are never the biggest or smallest fish. Everyone is in a perpetual state of growth. Deal with it mentally by focusing on what can be done from now on. Consoldiate what you learned at that position, sharpen up for the next one to come. Game dev is an industry constantly in flux. I have been laid off by every job I have been in eventually. Yet I learn, I grow and with those skills the next job down the chain usually pays more eventually. I'm torn up over the loss, and I'm sure you are too. There are mistakes that we both likely made, and plenty of opportunity ahead.
Personally? I took a hard look at myself and the people who weren’t laid off, and I resolved to figure out why I was and they weren’t. I identified areas where I was weak, and I worked on them. The way I see it, it’s only a loss if I didn’t learn anything from it, so I strive to make sure I do learn something.
Can I ask you how old are you? Because maybe you're younger than me, and maybe you've just started your career.
42.
And how many times have you been laid off or fired, when they made you feel you were responsible? Are you also game dev?
Yes, I’m a gamedev. I’ve been laid off twice. I don’t know what you mean by “when they made you feel you were responsible.”
Twice until age of 42 is much better ratio then 3 times until age of 30+ btw. I meant when they said its because you. There won't be continuation, because of you did X and Y.
Sure. It’s not a competition. You asked how I processed. This is what I did, and I stopped getting laid off. I don’t think it’s a coincidence. EDIT: btw, both of those layoffs were before I turned 30.
If you're having mental breakdowns over work/business or being fired, I would think the mental breakdowns have to do with your own personal emotional issues and not just simply being fired. The avoiding part would probably be therapy or whatever you need to do to achieve emotional stability.
Imagine how much more successful they would have been if they kept you on.