Employers Discriminate MMO, FPS Gamers

[Guest]

I personally have a lvl 80 Death Knight and a 6 figure salary. So whether or not game playing actually hurts people looking to get hired? It shouldn't, as any responsibly person knows when to play and when to not.

Note: I did have vacation at the time the expansion came out, this was merely coincidental and not planned. Since I went back to work I have played maybe 4 hours.

 

[fuser]

[citation][nom]demonhorde665[/nom]P.S. cigarette taxes pay for most of the govemernet funded ehalth care plans so i ahrdly see how smoekrs are a burden on the health care LOL, we pretty much pay for most cancer related health care , what i wonder is when the goverment will start levying the same taxes at other health hazderous industries , such as Alcohol, (which is only taxed a fraction comapred to cigarette/tobbaco taxes). or even better start taxing fossil fuel based power scources , since they are alone a the sole if not main cause of "smog days " in certain cities.[/citation]

Apparently smoking has affected your ability to type and think clearly. Cigarette tax does not even come close to covering the cost of smoking related illnesses in this country or the world. Are you smoking tobacco or pot?

 

[amasen]

I play World of Warcraft. I also have a job and a girlfriend of 3 years. In wow I am the Leader of an organization that has risen to the top 5% of world wide guilds. I have learned endlessly about working with people through this experience of creating a competitive organization that can only survive by staying competitve and fun.

As for me and my habits. I just got home from a week visiting my family. I got home and played WoW for 30minutes and then read a really good book for the next 3 hours... Keeping myself up until 2:30am.

Clearly my reading habit should be a consideration for my getting a job as it disturbs my sleep patterns.

 

[Guest]

“Are you smoking tobacco or pot?” …. No silly, if he smoked pot he would be partially brain dead, would want to break stuff, play the piano really fast and kill people.…… right ? that’s why high people do?

 

[fulle]

Interesting topic!

I work 2nd shift for a company doing Tier II it tasks. Ya' know, id creations, termination, fixing moron EU issues, and so on... but being on an off shift, my coworker and I often finish all our tickets and have long stretches of downtime. I watch movies, he plays Fallout and Team Fortress... and was at some point playing some Warhammer.

Now, the network traffic from my watching movies is greater, and I'm making as much noise, but the programmers who share our building pick on the gamer, and leave me alone.

I really do think its perceived as a maturity issue. Ya' see, the programmers never catch me yelling "Boom! Head-shot!" On the other hand, sometimes my coworker gets a little excited. It really really doesn't matter, and if he became counter productive I'd confront him about it. The reality is his gaming just improves his moral, and will lead to this person staying on this less than desirable shift for a longer period of time... but, alas, some moron programmers think they need to narc on him.

A smart IT hiring manager would know that gaming actually improves an individual's ability for fast problem solving, however... most IT managers I've come across don't understand much of anything... let alone have the ability to look outside the box on an issue like this. Basically, what I'm getting at is... if you tell your future boss you play videogames in an interview, you're an idiot... and I think this is a good article to bring that fact to the attention gamers.

 

[fulle]

[citation][nom]techguy911[/nom]Lets see i own my own computer store, when its slow, no work to do i play wow, i get to bed every night by 11pm and wake up at 8am.I have quit wow sometimes as long as 8 months when i have alot to do not everyone is an addict speaking of addicts they should be asking employees of they are smokers are the worst by far they take 10 min smoke breaks ever 30 mins and they are a burden on the health care system.[/citation]

Smokers take too many breaks eh? The question you have to ask yourself, is "does this negatively effect their work productivity". To which, the answer is "NO!".

I was recently (about 2 years back) a trainer for a large service desk. What I observed in my smokers is as follows:
-They took excessive breaks, and had 50%-%300 more AUX time.
-They had superior resolution rates.
-They had superior call times.
-They adapted to new issues much more quickly.

Why is this? Well, simply put, smokers talk about work on their short breaks! Surely, when you have 2 coworkers stuck in close proximity to each other for a 10-20 minute duration, and they are from vastly different backgrounds, age groups, and overall do not fit into each others' typical social groups... that's ALL they're going to talk about. Workers with superior communication have superior efficiency.

If you further examine smoker behavior, you'll notice that they choose to take their short breaks often when they experience something that causes some kind of elevated stress. For example, one of my techs would have a particularly difficult call, where he or she was not too familiar with the EU's issue, and needed to escalate the ticket. This person's a smoker, so he or she goes outside for a few minutes and proceeds to explain his/her plight with the other smokers, who educate him/her about the particular issue's root cause, and fix. Goes back in 12 minutes later a more efficient, superior agent for my desk.

Many times, I had to deal with a manager asking why I could give 2 shits about AUX times, and why I would just look the other way at smokers taking what they perceived as excessive breaks. My answer would always be a light shake of the head and "Its not an issue. They're talking about work."

I've observed the same increased efficiency from workers who play table tennis, and foosball. Communication is more important than being a nazi about break minutes. Good managers know this... most, however, just stare at spreadsheets and wonder why their teams fail to hit their numbers time and time again.

 

[goldendragoon84]

I work 50 hours a week and constantly get recognized for doing well. I am married and figure when I become a father my mmorpg play time will be cut. I go to bed every day at 11pm and wake up a 6am despite my game play. I also dedicate several hours a day to my wife.

I seriously don't get it. Since I was a child my family shunned my addiction to games. Meanwhile they would watch TV for 5 hours straight.

I think of it as the evolution of personal entertainment:
My grandparents used to escape the stresses of their own life by listening to the radio for hours a day.
My parents still escape their stresses by watching TV.
I escape my stresses by playing mmorpgs with my friends.

If anything I view my form of entertainment as the most productive. With recent technology at least gaming involves mental input and socialization to some extent. I can only name 50 ways in which gaming has helped me develop skills that I use at work.

Should I be discriminated for spending my time doing what I want while I still manage to be at work on time and perform better than my colleagues?

You can't find a more dedicated person than a gamer. Just make sure to keep them from playing games on company time.

 

[Mr_E]

Perhaps if employers IT departments would replace the windows task bar with a HUD display instead. At the bottom of your screen it shows the amount of money you have earned, updated in real time.

Since most name badges used by companies today contain RF chips, you could have a mini-map of the office building with a "track humans" that allows you to see where the herd of drone workers are... boss "mobs" would be in red.

Web conferences could be reorganized with party/raid interfaces, with each person having an avatar and class (job-title). Inspecting another employer would bring up an “achievement” profile that shows their progress on yearly objectives. Projects are renamed to quests. Business models are named "Raid Strategies." If you company wants to outperform its competitor, you’d best be "geared" for some series proprietor versus proprietor (PvP) battles.

...or they can just secretly not hire gamers.

 

[calmstateofmind]

I actually bring up playing video games in interviews. I tell them that I play COD on a tactical server and explain to them how we need to communicate/work together in order to accomplish our goals. Or, how I lead raids in WoW and I can manage people real-time and handle multiple taks at the same time.

Most interviewers are somewhat suprised that I use that to answers some questions up but they also tell me that they see it as a personal-able answer and a unique/creative one too.

And btw, I've never gotten an interview and not gotten the job.