For those of you in the industry, how many hours a week ?
This is just out of curiosity, I am estimating around 60 hours non crunch time. It could be a present, or past company, you don't need to post the names either. With that being said how many hours do you work a week typically? This is a supplemental post to my other thread if any of you read that Breaking into the industry: school vs self taught
I am curious because I am engaged, and my fianc
I am curious because I am engaged, and my fianc
Replies
Hours vary depending on project and how far into a project.
And
If you want it enough, then job > fianc
Yeh this is me. (not some average i got somewhere) sometimes i stay longer because its fun. I think its pretty easy to balance work and social life, I have it good.
09.00 -> 17:30
(I have 2 hours travel a day to get to and from work though, so I still don't get home until 18:45)
Seems like a good way to burn people out.
My last job was an 8-9 hour thing. If you actually work during the day you shouldn't have to supplement more hours imo. Seems like some people stare into space for a couple hours during the day and they end up working into the night.
/me shrug
I've never experienced an intense crunch so far.
1. Your studio's management is shit
2. You need to take a serious look at your workflows and processes, either personally or as far as your game's art pipeline is concerned
3. All of the above
40-45 hours for a normal week is what *should* be considered normal, 60 hours crunch. When you get beyond this, actual productivity seriously drops. Consistently working 60 hour weeks is not a good idea for anyone, if there is anyone here who does this, you should have a serious conversation with your managers about work load.
For me, the best way to avoid crunch is:
1. Get clear assignments from your leads, clear goals and clear standards for completion. This helps everyone to be able to schedule properly.
2. Find ways to get your tasks done in the allot ed time, instead of banging your head against the wall working 12-16 hour days, try and find workflow solutions to save time, work smarter etc etc.
3. If all my assignments are done, and I'm asked to crunch I refuse. Sure I will lend a hand and help out a little, but I will not crunch needlessly because other departments are behind and "everyone is doing it". Its very important to draw a line between work and personal life, and not let work become the only thing in your life, especially if you have a fiancee, wife, family, etc.
I work very hard to make sure I'm on task, know everything I need to do and understand how long it is going to take, and communicate with leads/managers if I feel something is going to take more/less time that allotted, so I get pretty pissed off when I'm asked to crunch under those circumstances. Some might think that I'm not a good "team player" because of this, but to me, its just about having self respect and being professional at your job.
If I am behind because of my own lazyness, stupidity, or poor planing I will stay extra. If I'm having a lot of fun, or want to finish something off so I can cue up bakes overnight I will stay extra. But I really despise the idea of mandatory crunch, or what is so seemingly common as "planned crunch" these days on projects.
How would you go about doing this? To me in this industry, from what I have heard, doing that sort of thing might get you removed from the company.
Thanks for the insightful reply EQ
However, hopefully you will have atleast one person above you that is sympathic to these issues(if not, the place you're at probably isnt the best). Its best to go to leads generally first, someone you have a lot of interaction with, so you're not making demands straight to the CEO or something.
Now, you want to be positive, and proactive in these situations. Don't wait until you're so pissed that you're about to snap, and then demand change. Instead, always try to keep an eye on work hours and how long it takes you to do stuff, and when the time comes to talk about workload; approach it in a manner where you're suggesting postive solutions.
IE: "Hey lead, we're spending way too much time on X or Z, how about we try and do A or B to speed up the process?" Then explain the stress working extra is having on your family/personal life. Generally, if you can go into this sort of conversation with the mentality that you're looking for better solutions, not just wanting to head out earlier, it will go better.
Talk to your co-workers, see if they feel the same way. If they aren't working as long as you, talk to them about how they get their work done on time, their process, etc. If everyone is in the same boat as you, try to co-ordinate some meetings with your peers and lead(s) about what you can do to make the department run more efficiently. Try to avoid the ultimatum type conversations, as this has a much higher likelihood of being met with resistance.
In general, communication is HUGE here, and without any communication, these situations can turn toxic fast.
It is very very very important, that everyone at a studio, no matter what the skill level, is honest about how long it actually takes them to do something. Its a given that not everyone works at the same speed, so the more realistic you can be when giving time estimates, the easier you make for yourself and the guys above you plotting hours in excel.
where i used to work, it was 70 to 80 hrs a week. i am glad that is not the standard, and the place where i worked was just poorly managed, and that the industry is not like that.
when i worked contract for the movie industry, that was only 8 hrs, and i would have to get approval or request to work over time, since that is payed 1 and a half. Good money there.
No problem.
There's no need for me to list out all that was said, cause EQ basically covered it, but it boiled down to 1) Handle your business, and 2) Don't let management bully you around or co-workers persuade you otherwise.
I follow this logic perfectly, and hope and pray that any studio I may work for has a great culture and work atmosphere, but I can also see where a person who has no industry experience and is trying to prove themselves (me), would have a difficult time refuting that kind of demand. I've talked to several industry guys who said that the way they finally broke in (and stayed in) was just by biting the proverbial bullet and grinding through a couple crappy gigs.
I know it varies so greatly from studio to studio however, so really, I would say when applying to places, just do your research.
Edit: and I just noticed that EQ covered my only real declaration, in a post made while I was typing this up. so yea, preach on, lol.
I've got a couple of friends who work in the industry, one at a AAA studio, and one at an indie studio (well-known, but only made up of a very small team, and only one 'big' game to their name).
The one at the AAA studio seems to be in constant fear of losing his job, people are being cut all around him, but he does seem to work pretty reasonable hours, mostly 9-6 or so, Mon-Fri.
The guy at the indie studio has no immediate risk of losing his job, since the company are riding some tasty profit from their last game, but he works a LOT. This sounds like a joke but they actually have 2 beds set up in the office, and he has been known to work well into the 2/3AM kinda time.
Again, not personal experience but it's another angle.
In addition to that, when being interviewed; ask what hours are normal, what hours when crunching, and how often crunch happens
If possible(I say this because its fairly common, if they like you), when going out for dinner/drinks with the team after a good interview, talk to they guys on the team after they've had a few drinks about work hours too. =P Maybe not everyone does this, but we would always take interviewies out for dinner/drinks, as it was a good way to get a sense for how well they would fit into the team. I'm sure larger studios this is unlikely.
Try to get some honest opinion on the working environment being accepting a position, it helps greatly if you know someone there.
Crunch time is always different. I work until I feel I am not being productive anymore. No sense in working more hours if your not being productive. Might as well go home, relax, get some sleep, have a break and come back strong. But 60+hours for crunching sounds about right.
Its probably because I am still young but I have never had a problem with crunch time or wished I wasn't crunching. Then again I have only worked on awesome projects that I totally loved so crunching was fun
Anyways, I am required to work 37.5 hours a week, but usually push 50 during crunches on projects I am not incredibly motivated on (getting the 'micromanagement' treatment on childrents liscence ports, or pitches for rip-off iphone games, etc).
Then on the flipside, I will very easily work 70-80 hours a week on things I am very stoked about, or are given plenty of input on. This is not required, but often done when they want to see the best work I can do.
Repeat post, but something every game development manager should see:
[ame]
Crunch for us is maybe a few 10hr days every 6mo.
I don't think I would want to work at any place that thinks a 60hr work week is the norm.
EDIT and yea that video is awesome.
BTW, whoever said "if you want it bad enough then JOB > fiancee" has a poor outlook on their quality of life. Jesus.
heh heh..
Actually I remember at Rockstar Games they typically ask YOU this question.
I think their reaction is typically...
"60 hours a week is easy! it's when it gets from your third month at 80-100 hours that it gets really hard".
Seriously though, 45 -50 tops right now. 60 or more when in crunch/focus weeks.
sadly even forced overtime is often unpaid or there's some weak compensation scheme going on - at the discretion of management, of course.
The interview is a two way street, remember that. Even if you're really hard up for a job and more than likely to accept even a nightmare offer, you can use the interview to gain insight into the company.
How would you go about interviewing them about working conditions. Flat out ask them how many hours is normal, how many hours during crunch, how often is crunch and for them to be honest about it if it is indeed a hell hole?
At Relic I'm working 40 hours non-crunch and generally 50-65 crunch.
At previous places it was a bit more (45-60 non-crunch, 65-80+ crunch).
It also depends on the project and such of course.
This is one of the bad things of working as freelance, they commonly want the work done in 1/2 of the time a normal worker spent in a studio. When i was younger i accepted all the works, but now all what i do must be in a basis of 8 hours per day, and not working in the weekends. The body passes bills, and very huge bills man.
Whether it's personal or professional work, I find 8 hours a day is a healthy average to shoot for.
That said, I recently went from standard studio jobs to my first freelancer gig and I've found there's a world of difference between "8 hours work" and "being at work for 8 hours".
Back at Funcom in Norway it was the same - usually 40 hours a week. We had 2 big projects - the other project had a lot of crunch tho...different management there.
Here and there I had to stay an entire evening to get things done, but that was not the norm.
I try to keep myself out of crunch situations because I know my creativity and problem solving capabilities rapidy decline. I rather have a good night sleep and recharge the batteries. Why spend 3 hours fiddling around at late night when you can solve an issue in 1 hour when your head is clear? (granted, that may not work for all disciplines
There is a stark difference between being passionate about your project enough to put extra time in if needed/wanted, and being forced to work insane hours because of poor time management/decisions.
That being said, I typically put in 40-45 hours non-crunch and whatever is needed, during crunch. I have been forced to work 2 months straight, 7 days a week, at past jobs. This is quite obviously rare and most certainly in dire situations.
I don't know where you pulled standard 60 hour weeks, but since you haven't been in the industry I assume you just heard a scary number somewhere and repeated it. That is not anywhere close to standard.
Obviously I don't do this all the time,I tend to try and work 8 hours days where possible.
I rarely work weekends these days, but projects with really tight deadlines I have to work non stop until finished.
When I did freelance it varied from no work to over 112 hours a week. I once went 72 hours with only one hour of sleep to get a job done... That wasn't fun, but I guess in hindsight it's kind of cool to know how far you can go if you really have to. It also taught me the hard way how things shouldn't be done.
Having experienced that I think more hours definitely does not increase productivity, but being well rested, better planning, workflows, and tools does.
Zero crunk time :P (so far..)
need to fix it a day later.
~ Snap.
Early finish fridays. So good.
For shame, sir. For shame!
Yes, it depends on the studio, and it also depends on YOU!
It really does, like, if you are given X time to finish Y, you can do it in the time you are given and be done with it, you can also decide to excel on what your are doing, and put in the extra time to really make it good! I end up doing this alot myself, to the point where the line between whether or not I'm a perfectionist or just slow starts to blur.
So far in my career, most crunch was "self imposed" crunch, where I realized that if I simply put in the 40 hours, it just wouldn't be enough to meet my standards and the project standards.
There's always those times where management will ask you to come on weekends, and on critical months you might not know what a weekend is like, for a few weeks, but after shipping the project you always have a few months of more laid off time.
(The weeks before a E3 demo are also very very stressful.)
So, I still manage to have a good life and life happy with my fiancee, I try not to damage my career and not to damage my relationship either with too much hours invested in the office. It's all about balance, but sooner or later you will need to put in your 60~70 hours a week on stressful and key times during development or right before a very important milestone.
I understand EQ point that you shouldn't crunch just because everyone is doing it, but I don't entirely agree with it. Live by the sword, die by the sword. If you stand beside your team during good and bad times, in the end it will pay off, management will notice your efforts and in the end you will be rewarded. (Project bonus, GDC trips, promotion, raises, etc)