Great Place to Work, Current Undergoing Significant Transformations/Growing Pains
Pros
- Total Ownership - Individuals and teams are empowered to chart their own course. Whether it's the hours you work, the side projects you want to pursue, or the direction of your discipline or product group, there is very little red tape or bureaucracy to hamstring you (but you DO need to have strong communication skills to make an argument for it, and/or bring data to back it up) - Work With Smart, Talented People - Riot has a very high hiring bar (from both a craft and a culture perspective), and it shows. You'll work with some of the most talented and passionate people you've ever met here, and you'll likely be inspired to grow as a professional and as a person - Beautiful Campus, Great Benefits - All the material aspects of working at Riot (comp, location, benefits, facilities) are all pretty much best-in-class. Large open campus, subsidized (and unlimited) food that doesn't suck, unlimited PTO, annual allowance to spend on games, generous relocation assistance, can request any hardware/software you need to help you do your job, etc... - Gamer Culture - If you're passionate about gaming/nerd culture, enjoy playing games at work, and want to use games as a way to build personal and professional relationships, Riot is [currently] a place where you're going to flourish
Cons
Elitist vibe/standards can make getting a job (and building a team) here unnecessarily difficult, and can lead to people experiencing a persistent "outsider syndrome" (e.g. assuming they're the least smart/talented person in the room, and worrying about their future employment). Giving individuals ultimate responsibility (without rigid rules to guide + protect them) has downsides if you're not confident enough to fight for everything you want. For example, there's no real guide to when you can use your "unlimited" PTO, and asking leads to a sort of cryptic "I don't know, do YOU think you should go on PTO?" attitude from management. That can be pretty anxiety-inducing if you're a newer employee and don't know exactly where you stand (the same is true of work/life balance more generally). Recent negative publicity has highlighted [cultural] growing pains that the company has historically been slow to lean into as it's transitioned into a much larger/multi-game studio. They essentially need to tame the "Wild West" of their early startup days, and put stronger rules and processes in place that protect the small number of individuals who might be unintentional "victims" of that small town culture, and that punish the small number of individuals that exploit it. That's all well and good, and the vast majority of folks seem to be in support of these changes. Unfortunately, there are pockets of resistance (leaders and old guard who don't want to let go of their "kingdoms"), and pockets of activists (who are using this as an excuse to start a witch hunt/power-grab and transform the culture of the company entirely from one that is united by a love of games into one that is divided by resentful identity politics). The outlook remains hopeful though, as senior leadership has remained largely transparent, mature, and clear-headed throughout the changes.
