James Hewitt discusses his Salary when working with GW

[MitGas]

Well, I think people should teach their kids that creative work is cool but a proper amount of money is just as -if not more- important after a certain age. There are a thousand reasons why and very few artists earn decent incomes overall… It‘s sad to see amazingly talented artists struggle financially and many never managing to earn a decent income. Many companies basically suck more artistically inclined people dry and then, if they realize their selfworth just turn to a fresh batch. I work in advertising for many years now and the biggest names/companies are usually the worst ones. Afaik the situation is very similar in the game industry…
 

main problem is that creative work is not as quantifiable as other work. The most amazing artwork still comes down to taste. Many people lack the eye to even see what is good work and what isn‘t. That‘s enough to justify not paying them as well as they should. Plus - if all else fails - there are hundreds hungry for that same job. 
 

You want an „easier“ life, become a doctor, lawyer, any of the „boring“ jobs. Or something else where business finds you instead of you having to hunt down jobs. As an artist, I can only suggest to start your own business - which however needs you to be a businessman before an artist, something not everyone wants to be. And not exactly easy for everyone as being a good businessman is just as hard as being a good artist. Takes certain talents, skillset, the right mindset and personality. 
 

Anyways, hope society will soon realize that artists and less „serious“ jobs are very important too and the people doing these things should get just as respected as others. 

[stratigo]

I mean, society hasn't realized teaching children is a job actually worth paying much for, so I have little hope for creative work.

 

[Neverchosen]

I truly believe that society understands the importance of creative labour and venerates creative individuals.

The issue is that they are not compensated accordingly, even when entire industries depend on their works.  

[Reinholt]

As someone who manages a team in an industry where compensation ranges from around there to extremely high, I will say this:

Too many companies view workers as a cost to be minimized. In reality, they are a resource to be cultivated. With that comes responsibility; my preference on my teams is to pay above market wages but also demand strong performance. As a manager, it's on me to coach the people who work for me and help them develop their skills (ideally to exceed my own!), but with that comes the ultimate responsibility to cut the people who can't perform after being given fair chances. It's unfair to the rest of a high performing team to keep sub-par people and thus increase the workload on the good ones, if you can replace them.

Most companies, in my estimation, do the reverse: treat everyone like a cost so they keep around the mediocre, turn good into mediocre by clearly not valuing them, and thus lose their best performers consistently over time. If a company often loses the people who seem to have talent, that's a sign this is going on.

Fix your management, GW.

[Noserenda]

Lines up with some other stuff i heard around the time, especially the recruiting for attitude rather than skill which i bounced off first hand.

I haaave also heard things have been better since then, primarily in benefits and bonuses rather than base salary, which is still pretty low though.

[Neverchosen]

14 hours ago, Reinholt said:

Fix your management, GW.

Thanks for sharing from a practical perspective! 🙂

This is a company worth a pretty penny and more than capable of compensating, rewarding and uplifting its dedicated and creative staff. I am in favour of drastic social reform. But until that day this small change could go a long way in fostering so much good will. Both with their employees and within the greater community.

Edited July 27, 2021 by Neverchosen

[Greyshadow]

Thank you for the original poster for raising this issue. Josh and James are hugely talented people and real gentlemen, it is disappointing to learn that they weren't properly remunerated for their outstanding work. I credit James with single handedly bringing back Warhammer Quest after his hundreds of hours of unpaid overtime resulted in what became the wonderful Silver Tower. The impact he personally had on GW's bottom line is likely in the millions of pounds. Very disappointing. Do creatives in the UK have a union ? (Short answer please - I don't want to start a non-warhammer industrial politics discussion thanks).

[Ggom]

I think, for the folks saying “fix middle management” I would like to share, from my (admittedly limited perspective in middle management in creative work) that middle management culture is very much a product of senior leadership. You don’t just do stupid if you have competent senior leadership. Competent senior leadership replaces mediocre middle management quickly. Mediocre middle management - or really, much of the directives taken by middle management - stem from senior leadership, assuming senior leadership is worth it’s salt. From my perspective, it is paradoxical to presume that a company has competent senior management with problems in middle management.

Edited July 27, 2021 by Ggom

[yukishiro1]

If you're a middle manager you get paid to take the blame for senior management's mistakes and to shield them from the rancor of your subordinates. It's what makes it a pretty thankless job, pay aside. If there's a "middle management problem" at a company, that's actually a senior management problem that senior managers are trying to hide. 

It is interesting to me that we haven't seen any "the job of a corporation is to make the most money, don't blame them for doing that" arguments made in this thread yet, when they are so commonly made to with regard to every other part of the hobby that touches on economic considerations. 

Edited July 27, 2021 by yukishiro1

[Zeblasky]

Yikes that's pretty bad. And that's besides the fact that undervaluing crucial creative personell is one of the worst long term mistakes you can make in a hobby business.

 

I guess guys at GW just gotta get a union going to fight this. You can't ask big corporations nicely and you can't fight them alone.

Edited July 27, 2021 by Zeblasky

[sandlemad]

The overtime thing is particularly bad and ties in with this whole “you have to have the write attitude but no, we’re not going to pay you” approach.
 

Similarly, as I understand it, significant parts of the Specialist Games and heresy products were quite literally designed during people’s lunch breaks and after work. Not even as a one-off thing but explicitly under the understanding that these were products that would not be worked on during normal hours. That’s not healthy to have as a normalised part of your working culture, and for minimal recompense.

[plavski]

A job where you're encouraged to talk about your salary is by far the exception than the rule. I've had meetings where the CEO of our programming house took us all into a room and explained with slides why none of us would have any idea what anyone else should be paid and we should all keep that info to ourselves.

[AaronWilson]

A large part of the problem in the gaming industry is that people are desperate to work in it because it's something we all love and it's a subject a lot of people have a lot of passion for. They can pay that wage because someone will do it for that wage, more out of love, passion and excitement to be in the role then for the money.

It doesn't make it right, but it's certainly the same across the broad scope of gaming industries. 

[yukishiro1]

Management would certainly prefer to keep compensation secret in most organizations...and that very fact suggests why it isn't good for employees for that to be the case. 

[JackStreicher]

8 hours ago, JustAsPlanned said:

Jesus H., that’s appalling. I knew that Geedubs were really stingy in terms of Ip and profits, but I didn’t think they’d be lacking this much in the wages of their own damn employees. 

I assume that's the reason why Duncan left.

[Beastmaster]

We pay premium prices for premium design, and the Designer himself is paid at minimum wages?

Trickle down myth busted. Again.

[The World Tree]

I've always been appalled that they don't advertise their salaries (and been consequently put off from applying), so this isn't surprising. Terrible practice. I can only hope it has improved in the five years since. They have regularly given large bonuses to their employees (which doesn't make up for low salaries).

[JackStreicher]

7 hours ago, MitGas said:

Well, I think people should teach their kids that creative work is cool but a proper amount of money is just as -if not more- important after a certain age. There are a thousand reasons why and very few artists earn decent incomes overall… It‘s sad to see amazingly talented artists struggle financially and many never managing to earn a decent income. Many companies basically suck more artistically inclined people dry and then, if they realize their selfworth just turn to a fresh batch. I work in advertising for many years now and the biggest names/companies are usually the worst ones. Afaik the situation is very similar in the game industry…

Indeed, though that's not the way it should be.
I for once could have worked in a Pixar-like company, doing 3D Modelling and Animation all day long. Yet the pay would be horrific, though you need an incredible amount of know-how, invested time and skill. That's why I went into informatics (Mostly Games) and I only freelance in 3D modelling besides my main job.

Imo the whole concept of Managers and company owners getting absurdly rich at the cost of their employees is where the society failed.
 

[Sarouan]

It's not just GW, it's everywhere. Mantic Games has exactly the same "problem". It's not a matter of "size" (small companies give the same answer, you know...it's not because they're small than the argument is better), but really how we see our relationship with work and salaries in our society and, well, the deep problem of capitalism with no control / limit to how much are paid each worker (including the top).

There shouldn't exist such huge discrepencies between salaries. There shouldn't be billionaires.

And it's also a culture problem...where you are considered as "not passionate in your work" when you begin to talk about salaries...or the mindset "work is its own reward", that leads to workaholicism. There is also some kind of taboo to talk about money in more than one family...

Good thing indeed we can talk about this more often. But it shouldn't be "just" about GW, you know. GW is only a symptom...not the Cause of All Evil.

Nepotism is...very common in private companies. After all, when the top have all powers and worker unions are seriously fought / discouraged...why wouldn't there be nepotism ? Private companies don't work as democracy because they're private - they're more dictatorial by default because of it. It's when you have different power levels in check and they're forced to negotiate between them that you can have something more similar to a democracy...and yeah, where workers can be treated more fairly. I work in a public company : it's still not ideal, but at the very least, the top can't do just as they please. They have to negotiate with worker unions at every level and there is a constant power balance. In fact, corporations should be treated just like "mini countries" - and there should be some mechanisms like in democracy more often to at least offer more solutions / ways to treat all workers more fairly. Just because someone made the company /paid for it doesn't mean he should have a life and death power over it - once workers join it, they also contribute to its success after all and should have a more active role in its gestion. But that also is a taboo in our current society...just look at how few we talk about these workers getting together to invest in a company and manage it with them being the actual "top management"...

But it's deeper and more complicated than just believe "GW is Evil". Like, if you remove GW, the problem will disappear...spoiler alert : it won't. But I do understand it's easier to hate a target rather than actually thinking and trying to find real solutions to a broader problem.

Edited July 27, 2021 by Sarouan

[Beliman]

16 minutes ago, JackStreicher said:

I for once could have worked in a Pixar-like company, doing 3D Modelling and Animation all day long. Yet the pay would be horrific, though you need an incredible amount of know-how, invested time and skill. That's why I went into informatics (Mostly Games) and I only freelance in 3D modelling besides my main job.

My 3D teacher worked in Dreamworks for about 4 years but moved to his own city (Barcelona) to work as a teacher (that's when I met him). Data delivery limit, stress, extra hours/weekends, etc... and not being paid as it should made him to look for another job. 

My cousin is still working in a FX company but he passed about 15 years being paid as a junior. Obviously, he moved to another company that was looking for a senior artist when he had the chance (and closer to his family!at least, a happy ending!).

It seems that all people that work on the same branch has a similar experience... 

9 minutes ago, Sarouan said:

It's not just GW, it's everywhere. Mantic Games has exactly the same "problem". It's not a matter of "size", but really how we see our relationship with work and salaries in our society and, well, the deep problem of capitalism with no control / limit to how much are paid each worker (including the top).

There shouldn't exist such huge discrepencies between salaries. There shouldn't be billionaires.

100% agree.

[Kaleb Daark]

 

1 hour ago, AaronWilson said:

A large part of the problem in the gaming industry is that people are desperate to work in it because it's something we all love and it's a subject a lot of people have a lot of passion for. They can pay that wage because someone will do it for that wage, more out of love, passion and excitement to be in the role then for the money.

It doesn't make it right, but it's certainly the same across the broad scope of gaming industries. 

So very this.

 

1 hour ago, JackStreicher said:

Indeed, though that's not the way it should be.
I for once could have worked in a Pixar-like company, doing 3D Modelling and Animation all day long. Yet the pay would be horrific, though you need an incredible amount of know-how, invested time and skill. That's why I went into informatics (Mostly Games) and I only freelance in 3D modelling besides my main job.

Imo the whole concept of Managers and company owners getting absurdly rich at the cost of their employees is where the society failed.
 

I knew guys at EA and also for a while at ILM, and yes it's the same across the board.

 

5 hours ago, Ggom said:

I think, for the folks saying “fix middle management” I would like to share, from my (admittedly limited perspective in middle management in creative work) that middle management culture is very much a product of senior leadership. You don’t just do stupid if you have competent senior leadership. Competent senior leadership replaces mediocre middle management quickly. Mediocre middle management - or really, much of the directives taken by middle management - stem from senior leadership, assuming senior leadership is worth it’s salt. From my perspective, it is paradoxical to presume that a company has competent senior management with problems in middle management.

I concur, it has to start from the top down.

Currently in society there's a mentality that says you don't need to have done the job yourself to manage it, and yes that's true, but the one thing you miss is the ability to sympathise.  In having done that job yourself you understand what it is the man is saying when he's telling you he has a problem or something is going to be late, whereas when you're a career manager who did his management degree at college you're just hearing noise and wondering why the box on your timing plan is red and not green.

It's no accident that the best managers are the ones with an in depth experience of what they're asking others to do, it translates into knowing what's realistic and who they need to talk to in order to get things done right, and that has a roll on effect downstream where it keeps costs down as they know how much something should be worth to get made or to have done.

I used to work with a highly talented visualisation team.  I was the design engineer feeding them CAD and they created amazing renders and VR, and they in their own right were amazing artists and alias modellers.  the sales team treated them like a dirt, as if their job was nothing more than pressing the print button, yet these guys were the ones literally responsible for making a customer go wow! I really want that.  Yet when a sale went through and the product was released all of a sudden it was the sales dude and the manager at the front of the photo.

It's the creatives ironically that become synonymous with the brand and become a brand in their own right - Reynolds, Rhodes et al.  Yet internally you often find that the recognition for such achievement is nothing more than the expectation to deliver to the same standard if not better than the last.

[Sarouan]

It's also a culture problem : in a society where the individual is praised for his personnal success above the group, and where you think the man at top with a big salary is "proof" of that success...no wonder the humble guy at the lower end of the ladder with ****** salary is generally ignored / unnoticed.

The masses are always anonymous when you talk about them. Yet they're people, they have their own story too. They're not just background characters in a Hollywood movie.

We really need to change that perception, but sadly that's not something you can do in one move of a magic wand.

We do need more empathy in our current society.

Edited July 27, 2021 by Sarouan

[Beastmaster]

Maybe… maybe the people who made a management college degree and are now working in management are secretly jealous of those doing interesting and creative work. Maybe they are just bored out of their minds by endless sales numbers, sales numbers, sales numbers. So, at least they want to get paid better as a compensation.

[Sarouan]

1 minute ago, Beastmaster said:

Maybe… maybe the people who made a management college degree and are now working in management are secretly jealous of those doing interesting and creative work. Maybe they are just bored out of their minds by endless sales numbers, sales numbers, sales numbers. So, at least they want to get paid better as a compensation.

It's more complicated than that.

I had managers who genuinely sympathize with workers and tried their best to help them (well...as much as their role allows it) and I had others who were really thinking they are God's voice and all peons under them just have to obey.

Managers are humans too. Well, mostly.

[Beastmaster]

17 minutes ago, Sarouan said:

Managers are humans too. Well, mostly.

Exactly. Humans, I suppose, want to do something meaningful, and want to be successful in what they do. And the only meaning, as well as the only measure of success in management lies in making more money. It’s depressing.

Not completely serious here. But whenever I heard people far „up the ladder“ talking about the passion for the actual daily work they do, it somehow sounded… hollow. And I get the feeling that they, just like everyone else, are caught up in a system they can’t control.

Edited July 27, 2021 by Beastmaster