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Bluetracker

Tracks Blizzard employees across various accounts.

Design roles at Blizzard ⬇️ * Associate * Mid * Senior * Senior II * Principal * Principal II * Associate Director * Creative Director * Game Director

Design roles at Blizzard ⬇️ * Associate * Mid * Senior * Senior II * Principal * Principal II * Associate Director * Creative Director * Game Director

  • Iksar
    Posted 4 years, 10 months ago (Source)
    Design roles at Blizzard ⬇️ * Associate * Mid * Senior * Senior II * Principal * Principal II * Associate Director * Creative Director * Game Director

    • Iksar
      Posted 4 years, 10 months ago (Source)
      There are designers who are "lead" but it is a word used to describe your function on the team, not a role that has a pay grade attached to it.

      • Iksar
        Posted 4 years, 10 months ago (Source)
        Lead can refer to being a lead of a specific discipline or it can refer to being lead designer of an entire project. Even in the cases where you are lead designer of a project, you still report to a game director with the ultimate creative say.

        • Iksar
          Posted 4 years, 10 months ago (Source)
          Creative Director, as Joe mentioned in his awesome thread, can have a couple meanings. We've had people in this role who were very design focused and people who were very art/narrative focused. Depends on the project.

          • Iksar
            Posted 4 years, 10 months ago (Source)
            Even at Game Director there are a few different actual titles, but it applies to so few I didn't bother to list. Some Game Directors are just that, others are Game Director and Vice President.

            • Iksar
              Posted 4 years, 10 months ago (Source)
              There aren't any hard and fast rules to tenure requirement, when we hire people we level them based some on tenure and some on talent.

            • yaowayy
              Posted 4 years, 10 months ago (Source)
              @IksarHS Would it not be a scary thought knowing that there are so many roles within a segment which many likely overlap such that if another restructure were to happen there is a lot of room for redundacy?

              • Iksar
                Posted 4 years, 10 months ago (Source)
                @yaowayy Not really, outside of Creative Director and Game Director the roles don't actually mean anything outside of what bracket of pay you are in.

                • Iksar
                  Posted 4 years, 10 months ago (Source)
                  @yaowayy Ultimately we decide what content we want to ship and hire the right amount of people to ship it. Depending on their experience, talent, background, etc, we assign them one of these titles and pay them accordingly.

    • Verienn1
      Posted 4 years, 10 months ago (Source)
      @IksarHS Tfw mid is not in the middle at all :(

      • Iksar
        Posted 4 years, 10 months ago (Source)
        @Verienn1 I would guess 90%+ designers are Associate, Mid, or Senior. So in some way, it kind of is.

    • BytesHS
      Posted 4 years, 10 months ago (Source)
      @IksarHS What are the current design teams? I saw your tweet about Expansion Design Team and that seemed like a new one. Are there any other changes to the structure?

      • Iksar
        Posted 4 years, 10 months ago (Source)
        @BytesHS I honestly am not sure how to even answer this question anymore. There are somewhere between 3-6 teams depending on who you ask.

    • BIGYKN
      Posted 4 years, 10 months ago (Source)
      @IksarHS Are candidates without any (relevant) schooling ever considered? I have a Masters, but in Supply Chain Management. Obviously, I have a passion for HS, but that only goes so far.

      • Chadd Nervigg
        Posted 4 years, 10 months ago (Source)
        @BIGYKN @IksarHS Absolutely. While game development schools are out there now and many provide excellent experience, I'd say it's still a minority of us that were trained that way.

      • Cora
        Posted 4 years, 10 months ago (Source)
        @BIGYKN @IksarHS I'm an Associate on Initial Design and I have a degree in Broadcast Communication with 0 Computer Science experience. It's definitely possible!
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