EA’s Hirer and Firer Claims UK Talent Pool is Healthy
Tells LGS audience to be ‘open to hires from other sectors’.
A common complaint SPOnG often hears from UK games developers is that there is only a limited - or even a diminishing - pool of homegrown development talent for them to employ.
Not so, according to head of recruitment for Electronic Arts U.K. Matthew Jeffery, who claimed in a talk at the London Game Summit earlier today that the UK and Europe has all the talent it needs, but that perhaps developers and their recruitment agents might well need to look in different places than they are used to in order to find it, suggesting that there are pools of highly-skilled and ambitious staff in associated industries such as aerospace and film industries.
“As an industry, we have to be open to hires from other sectors,” was Jeffery’s message, suggesting that a blinkered focus on experienced game developers was counter-productive industry-wide.
Also, speaking about recent graduates, often seen as a source of little more than cheap and malleable labour, Jeffery told the assembled devs: “Graduates make a huge difference to a business…They do not have the baggage that experienced staff bring with them…they are hungry with ambition.”
Ah! SPOnG fondly remembers the days of being young, eager graduates and school-leavers, keen to land a job in the videogames industry. There’s still plenty of them out there, recruiters of the world. And always remember – they work all the hours god sends, and for peanuts too!
Of course, speaking at a high-profile event such as the London Games Summit, Jeffery is not going to say much about the many questionable games industry headhunting practices which most of us either know about directly or through friends and colleagues in the industry. If you have any particularly funny or cringeworthy stories and anecdotes about videogames companies and their recruitment practices, then please feel free to share them in the forum.
Not so, according to head of recruitment for Electronic Arts U.K. Matthew Jeffery, who claimed in a talk at the London Game Summit earlier today that the UK and Europe has all the talent it needs, but that perhaps developers and their recruitment agents might well need to look in different places than they are used to in order to find it, suggesting that there are pools of highly-skilled and ambitious staff in associated industries such as aerospace and film industries.
“As an industry, we have to be open to hires from other sectors,” was Jeffery’s message, suggesting that a blinkered focus on experienced game developers was counter-productive industry-wide.
Also, speaking about recent graduates, often seen as a source of little more than cheap and malleable labour, Jeffery told the assembled devs: “Graduates make a huge difference to a business…They do not have the baggage that experienced staff bring with them…they are hungry with ambition.”
Ah! SPOnG fondly remembers the days of being young, eager graduates and school-leavers, keen to land a job in the videogames industry. There’s still plenty of them out there, recruiters of the world. And always remember – they work all the hours god sends, and for peanuts too!
Of course, speaking at a high-profile event such as the London Games Summit, Jeffery is not going to say much about the many questionable games industry headhunting practices which most of us either know about directly or through friends and colleagues in the industry. If you have any particularly funny or cringeworthy stories and anecdotes about videogames companies and their recruitment practices, then please feel free to share them in the forum.
Companies:
Electronic Arts
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