I have limited knowledge on these things; FD: I work for Ubisoft in their Massive Studio.
Ubisoft itself is incredibly silo'd; each studio and each function operates like a loosely coupled bundling of companies.
You can think of it like:
* Marketing has offices (or colo's in some offices) but has a completely seperate reporting structure all the way to Yves.
* (same for other business functions such as server hosting, exchange administration etc;)
* Studios operate with an entirely different culture from HQ.
* Studios develop games, those games are submitted for "stage gates" which is when Editoriale can say if something is fun, or if something needs to be cut or added.. Editoriale in HQ can only speak during those times (big milestones). Otherwise the Studio doesn't really talk to HQ. (save: marketing, I guess)
I can say that Massive is incredibly progressive, this isn't just a result of being Sweden, even some (not all) of the Swedes who work here think we're overcorrecting for progressiveness.
We had Sarkeesian on site a few times to consult on games (and paid her handsomely for the privilege)
However.. and this is a big however:
There is also a culture of partying in the upper echelons, self-promotion, congratulatory/promotional incest and an "untouchable ego" that a lot of the upper management seem to have, this means that people at the top stay there, enrich themselves and keep others out. This doesn't apply to Yves himself, strangely, I've met him many times and is a fantastically humble, down to earth and generous guy. In fact he's made many moves that are directly against enriching himself in order to ensure that nobody can get the idea of shuttering a studio and putting people out of a job- and has actively worked (personally) against crunch culture.
--
What I'm trying to say is that: each "head" is responsible for the culture they create; and some people are given the freedom to abuse that culture.
Yves see's that ability to abuse as a failure of HR and that's why (I speculate) that Cecile has been let go.
As far as I understand Serge has had no allegations levied against him; however it's unconscionable how much power he had- and it would have been easy to abuse accidentally (an off-hand comment/joke being taken as an instruction). Not saying he's not guilty of anything but that kind of power should not have been levied.
Notably the Editoriale team (gatekeepers for games) was recently expanded to be more diverse.. that diversity was all middle-aged white french guys who came from the same school and had worked in that department before.. so.. not very diverse.
I was just thinking "Huh, I used to work with someone who went to work for Massive" until I realized you were the same someone :) Interesting to hear how the Massive/Ubi editorial relationship works from the inside
> What I'm trying to say is that: each "head" is responsible for the culture they create
So often people forget that leaders set the cultural.
> Notably the Editoriale team (gatekeepers for games) was recently expanded to be more diverse.. that diversity was all middle-aged white french guys who came from the same school and had worked in that department before.. so.. not very diverse.
This saddens me. I do wonder if tech will ever see a proper shift in diversity within teams and leadership. But, what exactly is diversity?
Do you have any insight into what contributed to Far Cry 5 non sequiturs such as leaving out Native Americans (6.5% of MT pop) but including many more African Americans than would ever be present (0.45% of MT population) but fewer Asians than African Americans?
Edit: I'm genuinely curious how these things happen, whether intentionally or compromises due to budgets or time constraints.
I seem to recall Ubisoft working with a number Sarkeesian-type consultants in the years following gamergate. Seems like a case of the guiltiest being the first to accuse if I remembered that right, but I don't recall where I got the idea. Does anyone here know where I might have got that impression?
I don't think Sarkeesian could even possibly be the problem if Ubisoft HR changed their definition of harassment to allow sexual harassment and non-gamer journalists are reporting on it.
Companies have "woke" consultants in to make speeches all the time but it's performative and it never changes anything.
I am deeply troubled that we have normalised public executions on the basis of allegations. No person or group should have that power to effectively end someone’s career on accusations alone.
Reports of harassment at Ubisoft include Hascoet’s actions and statements with witnesses, actions that his coworkers mimicked after him, and also matter of official record[0].
An “allegation” does not mean a groundless accusation. Any claim, even a very obvious and serious one, would be referred to in media as “allegation” until the accused is convicted.
The conviction does not always happen even in clear-cut cases, as the matter might not end up in court for various reasons unrelated to the truth of the claim.
The fact that measures were taken by the employer (some measures appear to be directly detrimental to the company, such as firing someone in charge of most of their products) shows that the allegations are likely firmly based in reality.
[0] “…a definition of workplace harassment that was updated in 2015 to remove the example of a manager sexually harassing a reporting employee”
The article reports about multiple journalistic investigations by detailing the systemic corruption and coverups of sexual crimes bye the company managerial staff and HR, stemmed by the accusation of ex-employees on personal blogs, twitter, journalistic outlets - showing episodes of sexual harassment, sexual violence, penetrative rape - episodes often corroborated by several other current and ex-employees.
And the term you decide to describe all of this is "allegation" and "public executions". Interesting choice of words.
I mean, if you had enough informations to prove that what Libèration and Bloomberg wrote is unsubstantiated, that would be quite a revelation. In France, that would also carry heavy legal implications. So, I think a lot of people would like to hear more about that. Especially those fired right now from Ubi.
Otherwise, in the off chance that you can't exactly prove that such journalistic investigations are false...just tell me, honestly, what are you arguing about?
[+] [-] dijit|5 years ago|reply
I have limited knowledge on these things; FD: I work for Ubisoft in their Massive Studio.
Ubisoft itself is incredibly silo'd; each studio and each function operates like a loosely coupled bundling of companies.
You can think of it like:
* Marketing has offices (or colo's in some offices) but has a completely seperate reporting structure all the way to Yves.
* (same for other business functions such as server hosting, exchange administration etc;)
* Studios operate with an entirely different culture from HQ.
* Studios develop games, those games are submitted for "stage gates" which is when Editoriale can say if something is fun, or if something needs to be cut or added.. Editoriale in HQ can only speak during those times (big milestones). Otherwise the Studio doesn't really talk to HQ. (save: marketing, I guess)
I can say that Massive is incredibly progressive, this isn't just a result of being Sweden, even some (not all) of the Swedes who work here think we're overcorrecting for progressiveness. We had Sarkeesian on site a few times to consult on games (and paid her handsomely for the privilege)
However.. and this is a big however:
There is also a culture of partying in the upper echelons, self-promotion, congratulatory/promotional incest and an "untouchable ego" that a lot of the upper management seem to have, this means that people at the top stay there, enrich themselves and keep others out. This doesn't apply to Yves himself, strangely, I've met him many times and is a fantastically humble, down to earth and generous guy. In fact he's made many moves that are directly against enriching himself in order to ensure that nobody can get the idea of shuttering a studio and putting people out of a job- and has actively worked (personally) against crunch culture.
--
What I'm trying to say is that: each "head" is responsible for the culture they create; and some people are given the freedom to abuse that culture.
Yves see's that ability to abuse as a failure of HR and that's why (I speculate) that Cecile has been let go.
As far as I understand Serge has had no allegations levied against him; however it's unconscionable how much power he had- and it would have been easy to abuse accidentally (an off-hand comment/joke being taken as an instruction). Not saying he's not guilty of anything but that kind of power should not have been levied.
Notably the Editoriale team (gatekeepers for games) was recently expanded to be more diverse.. that diversity was all middle-aged white french guys who came from the same school and had worked in that department before.. so.. not very diverse.
[+] [-] consolenaut|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hatenberg|5 years ago|reply
- homophobic behavior - drugging subordinates - sexual harassment - alcohol excesses in the workplace
as well as his direct reports (selling drugs at HQ, assault, harassment.)
[+] [-] saos|5 years ago|reply
So often people forget that leaders set the cultural.
> Notably the Editoriale team (gatekeepers for games) was recently expanded to be more diverse.. that diversity was all middle-aged white french guys who came from the same school and had worked in that department before.. so.. not very diverse.
This saddens me. I do wonder if tech will ever see a proper shift in diversity within teams and leadership. But, what exactly is diversity?
[+] [-] sys32768|5 years ago|reply
Edit: I'm genuinely curious how these things happen, whether intentionally or compromises due to budgets or time constraints.
[+] [-] throwvatars5|5 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] SuoDuanDao|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] amp180|5 years ago|reply
Companies have "woke" consultants in to make speeches all the time but it's performative and it never changes anything.
[+] [-] GaryNumanVevo|5 years ago|reply
I would guess that genuine efforts are few and far between.
[+] [-] alitoiu|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] loraa|5 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] mtgp1000|5 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] drevil-v2|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] goblin89|5 years ago|reply
An “allegation” does not mean a groundless accusation. Any claim, even a very obvious and serious one, would be referred to in media as “allegation” until the accused is convicted.
The conviction does not always happen even in clear-cut cases, as the matter might not end up in court for various reasons unrelated to the truth of the claim.
The fact that measures were taken by the employer (some measures appear to be directly detrimental to the company, such as firing someone in charge of most of their products) shows that the allegations are likely firmly based in reality.
[0] “…a definition of workplace harassment that was updated in 2015 to remove the example of a manager sexually harassing a reporting employee”
[+] [-] noisymemories|5 years ago|reply
And the term you decide to describe all of this is "allegation" and "public executions". Interesting choice of words.
I mean, if you had enough informations to prove that what Libèration and Bloomberg wrote is unsubstantiated, that would be quite a revelation. In France, that would also carry heavy legal implications. So, I think a lot of people would like to hear more about that. Especially those fired right now from Ubi.
Otherwise, in the off chance that you can't exactly prove that such journalistic investigations are false...just tell me, honestly, what are you arguing about?
[+] [-] maroonblazer|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rbg246|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] RobLach|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] robinduckett|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] loraa|5 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] robinduckett|5 years ago|reply