Month: December 2020

I have received word that my employer will have some news on what our workplaces will look like in a post-pandemic world. There will be some official announcement later this month apparently. In January, employees will have individual discussions with their manager about their preferences and how that might match up with business needs.

All of this stems from the fact that we now know it’s quite possible to make video games from home. Some people have really embraced working from home and want to continue doing this, even when it is safe to return to our studios. Others prefer to go back to the old days and want to go in every day. While some want a hybrid of both. It’s a complex situation for any company, who have to weigh the desires of thousands of individuals, how those decisions can work together in a team context, and how all that affects the ability to make a good game. For example, what if someone wants to work full-time in a different tax jurisdiction than before?

My personal view at this point is that I don’t want to have to go commute to the office five days a week again. Even before the pandemic arrived, I thought working at home was a valuable and productive process. The odd time I was able to work from home felt great. Looking ahead, I would like to work at home for a minimum of two days a week. It’s quite possible I’d push for three days a week actually. I’d stay at home on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. Of course, it’s not entirely up to me if I can do that. There’s a team dynamic to consider. Maybe there’s a certain day of the week that everyone on the team needs to be at the studio. Who knows. What I do know is that the workplace, at least for my employer, has changed forever. Remote work has been legitimized. People won’t be able to go back to the old ways.

A lot about 2021 will be different and I’m looking forward to seeing that.

I have been to the dentist once since the pandemic started and that was in the late summer. Once my cleaning was done, they wouldn’t let me leave without scheduling my next appointment. I resisted briefly but I just wanted to get out of there and I also realize if I didn’t want to go again, I could just cancel later. At the time, I had no idea what the future would hold. Maybe the pandemic would get better and it would be even safer to go to the dentist the next time.

It turns out the pandemic is now worse. It is now more dangerous that it’s ever been. My appointment is next week. The World Health Organization is still recommending delay of routine dental visits. I am going to re-schedule the appointment for January. I’m not saying I’m never going to the dentist again. It’s just a delay of thirty days, so I can re-assess what the situation will be like in the new year. I think that is prudent and logical.

This year has led to some unique things that we never had to deal with before. One of them has been that millions of us are now working from home. The online meeting is now ubiquitous as a part of most white collar, professional jobs. When all of this work from home stuff first happened, I was on the FIFA team. My small group within that larger team numbered around twelve or so. Our Zoom meetings were fairly short and at first, no one turned on their cameras. At least one dude didn’t even have a microphone. He would post his updates in the chat window. He was without a mic for about six months I think.

Several month in, one or two people would turn on their cameras perhaps one day of the week, mostly Fridays. This was infrequent and for the most part, I did not know what my coworkers looked like since mid-March. Did some of them grow beards? Did some shave their heads? Did they grow out their hair? I do not know.

In November, I joined a new team and I immediately saw a huge difference in their approach to cameras during Zoom meetings. I would say over 95% of people have their cameras on for every single meeting. I began telling people that this team had a strong “camera culture”. Personally, I do not have my camera on at all during meetings. I only have one webcam in my entire apartment and it’s attached to my laptop, which is not a productive way for me to work. My desktop does not have a camera connected to it, so it’s not really even an option. I am often the only person in meetings that doesn’t have their camera on. I don’t feel bad about that. It’s a personal choice.

I am not alone in my stance. For example, my manager is the same way. She never has her camera on. There’s another guy on my team that I’ve known for almost a decade. He has publicly expressed that he will never get a camera while he works from home. There’s a lot of reasons for why I don’t care for being on camera but one of them is practicality. I am in my PJs for most of the day and I wear the same thing every day. Since it’s the winter time now, I wear a comfortable but a little worse for wear hoodie all day. It’s got holes in places. I don’t want people to see that.

Having your camera on means you can’t pick your nose or scratch your ass during meetings. I can’t yawn without making someone feel like they are boring me. The camera makes me devote energy into making my appearance and behaviour socially acceptable when I would rather devote that energy into real work and focus.

The argument that I’ve heard about having your camera on is that other people feel a deeper connection with you while you’re in a meeting. Putting a face to a name is the thing that they want, as some say. Perhaps that might be true but they’re not getting that from me. I’m no less effective in meetings just because my camera is off. I answer questions, bring up concerns, and provide updates just as well as the next person who is on camera.

I am fascinated about how strong camera culture is on other teams. I am guessing it varies quite wildly. Whatever your stance is, I hope you are true to your ideals!

Over the weekend I ate a whole 142g bag of ginger chews candy. I bought a bag as an add-on item on Amazon order. These delicious little bastards were originally something I ate for the first time in a care package that I got from my employer. I didn’t immediately like them but after I ate the third one, it started to grow on me. At 3g of sugar and 16 calories per piece, it’s not the worst candy out there and the 270g of ginger makes me think it could be slightly therapeutic.

I gotta admit, I had to buy something on Amazon this evening and I bought five more bags of the ginger chews. The order should arrive tomorrow. I can’t wait.

Almost a month to the day I started working with my new team, I submitted my first batch of changes and additions to the game today. It was more data than actual code that I checked-in but it all helps and is necessary for what I am responsible for.

Normally, I would have preferred to submit my first set of changes on a new team a bit earlier than a month in but I’m not worrying about it on this team. There has been a lot to learn, so it feels a bit normal to wait until now.

For those who are wondering, no I did not break the build on my first check-in. This particular team has a robust submission validation system that compiles and runs your changelist to see if it breaks anything before checking it in on your behalf. Technically, no one should be able to break the build but no system is perfect.

Now that I have things rolling, I will probably do another submission next week.

A few days ago, as I was wrapping up the work day, I randomly wondered what time it was in London, England. Since it was around 6pm here, it was 2am (the next day) in London. I did some quick math and realize if I lived in London and wanted to match the work hours on the west coast exactly, my work day would be from 6pm to 2am locally. For someone who stays up pretty late anyways, that’s not a terrible work day. It’s not ideal either however. One of the drawbacks would be on Fridays. You wouldn’t start your Friday “work day” until 6pm, while locally, everyone in London is now enjoying the start to the weekend. I guess on the other end, on Monday morning and afternoon in London, I’d be still on my “weekend” as Mondays wouldn’t start until 6pm.

I suppose there could be some flexibility to the start and end times to the day. For example, some people start earlier in the day so they can leave earlier. Similarly, I could start the work day at 4pm London time and be done by midnight. Still, the biggest negative is that your evenings are gone. Forget about being social during the weekday. Then again, during a pandemic, this isn’t something you should be doing anyways. On the flipside, your late mornings and early afternoons are all free. You have all that time to run errands and get stuff done while regular local business hours are in effect.

Like I said, it’s not the worst working situation possible but it’s not perfect either. The reason this even popped into my head is because with the pandemic, the whole corporate world has been upended. People are working from home in all sorts of different places. Just on my team alone, I have had co-workers who worked from Dubai, the province of Ontario, and closer to home, on Salt Spring Island.

I am simplifying it a bit, but it seems like you’re no longer tied down to one place if you want to work somewhere specific now. It will be so interesting to see some data about where people are working from now in relation to where they used to reside for work.

In my current capacity at work, my team coordinates with another team for the development of a game. This team is located in California. They’re a pretty independent team with a strong culture. I just found out last week that this team gets a four-week holiday break. That means this week is their last week at work and they’re off until the new year.

They are so lucky. Four weeks is long enough for a real and genuine break when you can actually get refreshed again. With holiday travel grounded for most folks (hopefully), that means they won’t have to deal with the hassle of flying or driving.

Like a bunch of suckers, my team has to work another two more weeks before our break arrives. I am so envious of the other team!

This is one of my favourite SNL skits in recent memory because it deals with a situation that I can identify with, having to poop at work. Well, that’s no longer a problem now, with working at home and all, but it definitely was a problem in the beforetimes.