Electronic Arts Reviews

Pros

Really good health insurance and benefits; multiple perks (free games, spot stock); really talented coworkers

Cons

Very political system; management doesn't understand the engineering side of things, so there is a visible divide between leadership and development

Pros

Good salary and good employer

Cons

None at all , you get what you want

Pros

A big corporation with global footprint. It can teach you how things functions in an MNC world. Hosts a variety of teams and projects from small scale (less than 20 people) to large scale (over few hundred people). The experience variate based on the team you are part of, and ranges from from good to terrible depending on your peers. For an average person, it's a good place to gain experience to and move on, and that's how they have designed their culture - more temporary offerings. The job related stress can variate from role to role and team to team. If you know how to get your work done, no one will bother you. Depending on the role, the work life will be hard to balance. Also some days, you'll have nothing much to do, and other days, there will be unmanageable amount of work for you.

Cons

While some teams are highly functional and helpful (rare though), most are full of people with corporate mindset. A good grasp of office politics is needed for long term survival, otherwise no matter how hard you work for the company, you'll be just a name that will be forgotten. Mostly all of the teams prefer hiring by referral. Their work place is full of friends and family culture and you'll realize over the time that half of your team is somehow related to each other (lol). Sadly, this is very common phenomenon globally, as they say, it's more of who you know. Unless they are unable to find someone in their circle, the job posting is made public. If you are hired as an outsider, there will be hardly any help for you. I have figured that there's one way to validate if your experience will be a misery or pleasure: If you're handed in a bunch of external contact emails/phone numbers in your first rampup period, you are screwed, and if you're told to walk to a person seated locally. you'll probably be in good hands - if that person likes you. Only the people higher up in hierarchy can rate your performance, and yes, there's a performance file on your name (mostly unknown to you) Survival tips for new comers: - Make friends higher up in hierarchy. - Make sure your immediate manager and team leads are cool with you. - Smile more often (hard for SEs). - Despite the company's cultural tag line of "being bold", don't try anything bold unless you know what you are doing, and can tackle the outcomes. - Be prepared to deal with lower IQ people working as your seniors. There will be lots of them. You'll probably discover it very soon that these people still exist here because of their strong connections within the company, hence, don't mess with them, they'll silently kill your dreams; they have powers. - There will be a lot of new people on your team, and they will be mostly friendly, because they're in a same boat as you. They also make good friends. - If at any moment you get even a tiny sort of hint that you're finding it hard to fit in the team, start to look a new job asap, and don't wait for your contract to mature to do that. It's just easy to find a good job while you have one ongoing. - Just doing adequate work is not enough. It will work, but you will make yourself replaceable. Make sure you socialize with your team members. I know it can be hard, but the ones who do, they survive for the long run.