Up to 25 people fired from Valve

[ScarT]

I'm quoting this from IRC, which means this isn't anywhere near official or anything like that

a friend close to the situation says gabe wants to shake it up and cut the fat

[Epifire]

Obviously Gabe has had it with the fat jokes and started checking off the list of his prime offenders.

[Major Banter]

Personal conjectures?

1. Requested cull. A clearout of people who had expressed a wish to leave in the near future, or were considering it. Most likely offered severance package, and hell, they have Valve on their CVs.

2. Necessary cull. A clearout of people who were no longer of true use; as Delta suggests, no longer required, burned out, unsuitable or otherwise. A wide clearing would be more justifiable, more acceptable and altogether kinder and more efficient. Grim fact of reality; you need fresh blood, and sometimes you have to clear the room for it.

3. Enforced cull due to considerable issues in Valve, whether that be related to business, internal politics, direction or cut-backs. May also be a result of changes of policy. Perfectly possible they're cutting down the hardware team.

4. Finally, a rather grim thought, and one that's been mentioned a few times - serious business issues, whether that be selling, splitting or complete structural revamp.

Judging from the twitter feeds of several fired employees, and their LinkedIn profiles, there's a wide mix of 'about to leave/left voluntarily' to actually presented with a termination notice on that very day. Honestly, I'm unsure what to think. It certainly makes no impact on my view as Valve as a company - that's what companies do - but it does interest me why they've cut (assuming 300 employed staff) 8% of their staff.

I'm reasonably sure it has little to do with HL3, and neither do I give a toss. Source 2, gentlemen. Stop angsting over an engine that's 11 years old.

[Major Banter]

Just found this list, not sure how it tallies with OP's.

Moby Francke, Half-Life 2 character designer and Team Fortress 2 art lead
Jason Holtman, director of business development for Steam and Steamworks
Keith Huggins, character animator and animator for Team Fortress 2 “Meet the” video series
Tom Leonard, software engineer for Half-Life 2 and Left 4 Dead
Realm Lovejoy, artist for Half-Life 2, Portal, and Left 4 Dead. She was also part of the original DigiPen-turned-Valve team that created Narbacular Drop, the inspiration for Portal
Marc Nagel, test lead for Half-Life, Counter-Strike, and patch updates
Bay Raitt, animator for Half-Life 2, Team Fortress 2, and Portal
Elan Ruskin, engine programmer for Left 4 Dead, Portal 2, and Counter-Strike: Global Offensive
Matthew Russell, animator for Team Fortress 2 “Meet the” video series

May be the same list for all I know.

[Deh0lise]

If you saw the las video conference of Gabe talking about its company and game development (around 1 hour) he said something like "when you gotta fire someone you've gotta do it directly" or something like that, straight and strong.

In my opinion, and after watching that video I think he just fired up those under-productive (he emphasized the need for productivity in the video and how someone good is productive). As the structure of the company is plain and collaborative I guess there might be difficulties spotting those free loaders. Well, he spotted them.

[Epifire]

If you saw the las video conference of Gabe talking about its company and game development (around 1 hour) he said something like "when you gotta fire someone you've gotta do it directly" or something like that, straight and strong.

In my opinion, and after watching that video I think he just fired up those under-productive (he emphasized the need for productivity in the video and how someone good is productive). As the structure of the company is plain and collaborative I guess there might be difficulties spotting those free loaders. Well, he spotted them.

Makes sense but you think just taking an employee aside and having a talk about things would straighten it all out. Those are some long time employees just to fire on the whim of not being as productive. I am wondering if we could see some blog posts about this. Nothing better then hearing it from the horse's mouth if you see what I mean.

If it was just cleaning house I would suspect some unhappy people to be talking about it.

[theCommie]

In my opinion, and after watching that video I think he just fired up those under-productive (he emphasized the need for productivity in the video and how someone good is productive). As the structure of the company is plain and collaborative I guess there might be difficulties spotting those free loaders. Well, he spotted them.

It's hard to imagine that people like Jeri, and Bay to be 'freeloaders'; they're renown for their talents in things they've done on their own time. Hell, Moby alone gave us the entire TF2 art style.

[stoopdapoop]

who the fuck is bay? why does everyone know him except me?

Also, on the subject of valve being bought, I doubt that valve (as we know it) would ever sell out. Gabe talks endlessly about the benefits of not having to report to anyone, and how it's sorta the reason why valve looks and acts the way it does.

I also doubt that these people are "the fat" that Gabe was talking about a week ago. The reason I know Elin Ruskin by name is because of the presentation he gave at GDC just last year about l4d's dialog system.

[Dives]

What Gabe has to say on the manner.

"We don't usually talk about personnel matters for a number of reasons," Newell said. "There seems to be an unusual amount of speculation about some recent changes here, so I thought I'd take the unusual step of addressing them. No, we aren't canceling any projects. No, we aren't changing any priorities or projects we've been discussing. No, this isn't about Steam or Linux or hardware or [insert game name here]. We're not going to discuss why anyone in particular is or isn't working here."

http://www.joystiq.com/2013/02/13/newel ... -projects/

[Plague]

It's possible an internal timeline was set for clearing out potential leaving employees.
I.E. they could all have decided they were prepared to formally leave at various times but stayed for a period of time that allowed them to finish their work and probably even get some assurance on where they go to next.


Have we checked the linkedin profiles of any of them?

[Epifire]

Well like I said Blogs are about the only way we are gonna find out (since Valve is keeping uptight about it). That or some one nabbing messages or mail from said fired employee. Otherwise we just as well can go on speculating without any real clue as to why.

I still say it was all those fat jokes.

[Armageddon]

Well this sucks, Valve has never fired anyone before. Gabe even said the amount of people that had left the company since the start could be counted on one hand.

[nub]

Why anyone would possibly think Microsoft is buying out Valve because a group of employees were fired or laid off is beyond me. I don't see how it would correlate. Maybe if they voluntarily quit or something, but that doesn't seem to be the case.

Still, I doubt Valve would ever sell out like that. As long as Gabe Newell breaths, Valve should stay independent.

[ScarT]

Well this sucks, Valve has never fired anyone before. Gabe even said the amount of people that had left the company since the start could be counted on one hand.

Not true. They hired some guy that leaked an early version of Half-Life ages ago.

[Ale]

And how does people know they haven't fired anyone?