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working for GW? Not in a store, per say, but more along the lines of the corporate levels? I've almost finished my degree and feel like I'd like nothing more than to be surrounded by miniature gaming for the rest of my life, even if that was handling public relations or sales, to crunching numbers for budgets and accounting. Of course my dream job would be more along the lines of lore, model design, writing codexes and painting, I'd be happy with any of the aforementioned jobs. Does anyone have any idea?

Well, before everyone jumps in and says do not do it and posts their tales of misery working for GW you can just go to their web page and look for job openings.

http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/content/article.jsp?aId=4300002

Blackmoor wrote:Well, before everyone jumps in and says do not do it and posts their tales of misery working for GW you can just go to their web page and look for job openings.

http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/content/article.jsp?aId=4300002

On that note, no need to dissuade me, chances are the employment won't come to fruition anyways. Positive reinforcement only, if it pertains to why I shouldn't do it, I don't want to hear it.

You shouldn't do it. note that I didn't say why, which means it isn't on your list of what you don't want to hear

Unfortunately as it is a forum you cannot really dictate which form of response you'd rather receive, if it's within the rules it's likely to go.

Most of the negatives seem to come from the retail workers, being a retail job there's not much to really expect. I haven't worked for them though so won't comment on something I don't know.

Good luck in your search.

I would guess you would apply on the site and send them a resume, maybe call and check on it if its been awhile and send them a thank you card for considering you. At least that's what I've been told on how to get a job (ive never held a corporate position though so salt when listening to me)

Lots of luck to you!

Same as any other job, send them a resume, and display your desire via the power annoyance.

I had a lot of friends who worked up in Lenton when the big purge happened a few years back (wasn't it like a third of head office staff was laid off?) a lot of people in graphics, they said it was actually a really good relaxed atmosphere and was unhappy they lost the job, a few of them weren't even in to gaming.

Be prepared to move. GW has a history of moving staff all over the country (US) to fill positions. If you're willing to accommodate, GW also has a history of promoting from within. If you have the skill for it, you would spend a number of years working retail, trade sales and then possibly management. Try to avoid getting fired at any one of these steps - all to easy when your store does not meet it's sales target or GW corporate reorganizes.

BLOODCLAWallday wrote: working for GW? Not in a store, per say, but more along the lines of the corporate levels? I've almost finished my degree and feel like I'd like nothing more than to be surrounded by miniature gaming for the rest of my life, even if that was handling public relations or sales, to crunching numbers for budgets and accounting. Of course my dream job would be more along the lines of lore, model design, writing codexes and painting, I'd be happy with any of the aforementioned jobs. Does anyone have any idea?

1. You are highly unlikely to obtain a position for GW Corporate being straight out of college without knowing someone high up. If you lack that, you'd like have to start as a lowly grunt working in a GW store local to you. GW is a company who receives massive amounts of applications, why are they going to take the chance on some random guy with a brand new college degree? I only say this as that's the present business mind in the USA right now. If you do not have experience, have a fresh diploma, and are green / young, prepare to struggle to find a job. Its unfortunate, but realistic in todays USA economy. There are hundreds of applicants per job right now.

2. If you happen to get lucky to get in somehow, be prepared as someone above mentioned, to get moved around. As an example, the current store manager in Voorhees, NJ just got shipped up from a store in Texas. Trust me, you don't really want to be in NJ for the winter. GW employees do not magically get hired to sit in the main office, they earn that. Your not going to get to go into product design unless you have proven you know how to do that. Have you written any independent codices? Do you have any home grow campaigns you've designed? Do you have experience sculpting? These are things you can sell yourself on.

3. If you are hired, accept the fact you are completely expendible. There have been vast rumors of "the low man is out" for years in GW. That refers to the manager who is lowest on the selling listing in a region gets axed every year, the corporate sales guy lowest gets axed, i used to laugh.. but i've watched multiple manager get canned over and over who had years of seniority and were great for the company.

Best of luck, I hope you get lucky. But GW is not a company know for their business mind or smart decisions. They are a cut throat global company, run by a boys club. You probably going to have to give it a few shots of applying just to get an interview.

You could always make a mask to look like an employee, then kill them and take their place. As for a realistic answer the best way is to work your way up. Most big companies I have seen promote from within. Just don't be afraid to be ambitious.

I applied to be a GW writer once and they replied to the effect that my writing ability wasn't quite to the standard they were looking for.

Which given their own general lack of writing talent, I found quite insulting.

i remember the ever-living rule in the Necron Codex written by Matthew Ward, it cost alot of problems because people didn´t know what the rule mean. The best thing you can do is to work your way up, or maybe try to find some person from GW and contact him.

njpc wrote:

BLOODCLAWallday wrote:

You are highly unlikely to obtain a position for GW Corporate being straight out of college without knowing someone high up.

Actually, that is EXACTLY the type of people they were hiring. Young, cheap, disposable, and lining up to drink the Kool-Aid was the name of the game in years past.

BLOODCLAWallday wrote: working for GW? Not in a store, per say, but more along the lines of the corporate levels? I've almost finished my degree and feel like I'd like nothing more than to be surrounded by miniature gaming for the rest of my life, even if that was handling public relations or sales, to crunching numbers for budgets and accounting. Of course my dream job would be more along the lines of lore, model design, writing codexes and painting, I'd be happy with any of the aforementioned jobs. Does anyone have any idea?

If I were to give you an Idea for someone coming out of school.......

I would put my resume into any and everyone I know except GW. I would go in on a young upstart company, get them off the ground, and make my bones in the "Industry" so to speak.

The issue here being you want to get into the "Industry", not just one particular nich of a nich. (I/E GW)

Gaming theory, statistics, some setting, a few writing and creative writing classes, start out with a bite, cut the elephent up into small parts, get a foothold,and push hard with a drive.

Get in touch with a few small games, get them under your wing, and push it to the next level, then keep pushing.

The small mom and pop shop gaming companies that are predominate as gamers here on Dakka are ... a lot. You would do well to send them some tells and throw your name in numerous hats to almost the point of being recognised as "That's the damn dude that keeps calling, e mailing, or contacting me...."

Not to the point of being a tool, but to the point of offering up your resume to these guys, getting in on the ground floor, and getting some work experience, and cutting your teeth. CONS, gaming stores, calling these cats up on the phone, contacting them by E mail, etc.etc.etc.

Don't expect to get an easy pass, either. Your trying to get into a nich hobby business, so money doesn't come rolling in by the buckets. Hard work and a lot of teeth getting kicked in.

Just my opinion. GL to you.

I worked GW retail and in the US Corporate Headquarters. I loved working for the company. The atmosphere was great, we understood in a sales environment that you either sold alot or were gone. That is true in most sales jobs.

If you really want to work for GW, apply, get to know people, make them know you want the job.

Don't expect to become a games designer or a writer. But there are a lot of other jobs with the company.

Good luck!

You don't mention what degree you're finishing so this will be pretty general.

You need to identify your job skills and qualifications and make those clear. Your love of their games is an added bounus but will not get you considered unless you're qualified for a job they're looking for.

And keep in mind all the creative stuff is done out of the UK so sculpting, graphic design, writing etc is not going to help you get a job in the US.

So you'll want to get CPA licence, or marketing experience, or manufacturing expertise or whatever. And keep in mind a lot of the sales type jobs are hired internally out of their retail folks.

If you're more into the creative side then look at Reaper or another US-based mini company over GW.

Create your own job, use your business knowledge to work for yourself. Seriously.

Learn to sculpt and make your own stuff. Most game companies are small and the developement areas are already staffed, usually by the company owners. If you really have talent with games and miniatures then you should pursue it for yourself. It never hurts to work for somebody else to see how their business runs but you also never get much reward for doing all the work for another company.

GW is a terrible business model to follow, yes they turn a profit and stay in business but they don't opperate like a normal business. If you study business at school you will understand the proper foundation of marketing and how to impliment innovation to keep the business alive and growing. GW exsists at this point solely because of their size, they abandoned proper business sense back in the 90s.

If you really love GW by all means go to work for them, but the people I've known that have were immensely disappointed and it's a go nowhere posistion for 99% of those that try. There's a huge turn over rate with them as their working conditions just suck.

If you are smart and ambitious then your best efforts should be applied to creating a sucessfull business of your own, not giving all your hard earned gains to somebody else. A miniatures business can be started for peanuts compaired to most other industries, which IMO is all the more reason why you should look into creating your own company.

paulson games wrote:Create your own job, use your business knowledge to work for yourself. Seriously.

Learn to sculpt and make your own stuff. Most game companies are small and the developement areas are already staffed, usually by the company owners. If you really have talent with games and miniatures then you should pursue it for yourself. It never hurts to work for somebody else to see how their business runs but you also never get much reward for doing all the work for another company.

GW is a terrible business model to follow, yes they turn a profit and stay in business but they don't opperate like a normal business. If you study business at school you will understand the proper foundation of marketing and how to impliment innovation to keep the business alive and growing. GW exsists at this point solely because of their size, they abandoned proper business sense back in the 90s.

If you really love GW by all means go to work for them, but the people I've known that have were immensely disappointed and it's a go nowhere posistion for 99% of those that try. There's a huge turn over rate with them as their working conditions just suck.

If you are smart and ambitious then your best efforts should be applied to creating a sucessfull business of your own, not giving all your hard earned gains to somebody else. A miniatures business can be started for peanuts compaired to most other industries, which IMO is all the more reason why you should look into creating your own company.

THIS!

If you want to be successful do not work for GW. PERIOD!

Like others have said you will be stuck in some back end position doing paper work.

The work environment from what I hear is terrible. Start your own company

I am doing the same thing however I am no businessman.

Try for an Internship, it is a great way to get to know the company and its people.

BaconSlayer wrote:Actually, that is EXACTLY the type of people they were hiring. Young, cheap, disposable, and lining up to drink the Kool-Aid was the name of the game in years past.

As for the underlined, what do you mean by this, does GW have Kool-Aid in the bubblers (Drinking Fountains) in the UK?

You know what it means.

Be a loudmouth on the Internet. Worked for me.

DeathReaper wrote:Try for an Internship, it is a great way to get to know the company and its people.

BaconSlayer wrote:Actually, that is EXACTLY the type of people they were hiring. Young, cheap, disposable, and lining up to drink the Kool-Aid was the name of the game in years past.

As for the underlined, what do you mean by this, does GW have Kool-Aid in the bubblers (Drinking Fountains) in the UK?

I've also heard they have free candy and a puppy in a windowless van out in the parking lot.

DeathReaper wrote:Try for an Internship, it is a great way to get to know the company and its people.

BaconSlayer wrote:Actually, that is EXACTLY the type of people they were hiring. Young, cheap, disposable, and lining up to drink the Kool-Aid was the name of the game in years past.

As for the underlined, what do you mean by this, does GW have Kool-Aid in the bubblers (Drinking Fountains) in the UK?

It's a reference to cult leader Jim Jones who had his congregation drink poisoned fruit drink (apparently not Kool-Aid, according to Wikipedia).

In general, the phrase 'drink the kool-aid' means 'buy into the hype' of some sort, often with negative connotations. For example, someone buying an iPhone and liking it could be described as 'drinking the Apple Kool-aid' especially if they're annoying loud about it to their friends.

Call their HR department. Send them your resume. Tell them how much you love them. Even going there dressed in a jacket/tie, shaking a few hands and just introducing yourself would make a HUGE difference. Remember at the corporate level, they aren't hiring the leetest gamerz in the world, they are simply hiring accredited and reliable accountants. If they don't have any job openings, simply write down the person you talked to's name and then ask them if you can check back with them in a few weeks. Call that same person once a month or so, don't be a pain in the ass, just let them know you are still interested. Send that person Pizza for lunch (bribe them). Professional consistency(not annoyance).

Alot of people giving advice in this thread seem to be mixing up with working at the Corp HQ with working in a store...yes store managers get moved all over the place...lowly grunts at the HQ on the other hand..

Balance wrote:It's a reference to cult leader Jim Jones who had his congregation drink poisoned fruit drink (apparently not Kool-Aid, according to Wikipedia).

In general, the phrase 'drink the kool-aid' means 'buy into the hype' of some sort, often with negative connotations. For example, someone buying an iPhone and liking it could be described as 'drinking the Apple Kool-aid' especially if they're annoying loud about it to their friends.

I thought it was a reference to Jonestown, but it confused me, because they did not drink kool-aid.

I did a research paper about jonestown, interesting stuff.

I wonder why people say that when kool-aid is nothing more than a tasty beverage.

Flashman wrote:I applied to be a GW writer once and they replied to the effect that my writing ability wasn't quite to the standard they were looking for.

Which given their own general lack of writing talent, I found quite insulting.

Actually it's a compliment... If someone's work is always gak and he says your work is no good then you must be doing something right

It doesn't matter what company you work for. There will always be some useless person asking you to attach cover letters to your TPS reports.

Kid_Kyoto wrote:You don't mention what degree you're finishing so this will be pretty general.

You need to identify your job skills and qualifications and make those clear. Your love of their games is an added bounus but will not get you considered unless you're qualified for a job they're looking for.

And keep in mind all the creative stuff is done out of the UK so sculpting, graphic design, writing etc is not going to help you get a job in the US.

So you'll want to get CPA licence, or marketing experience, or manufacturing expertise or whatever. And keep in mind a lot of the sales type jobs are hired internally out of their retail folks.

This.

You have to clearly identify what's in it for them if they hire you. Without going overboard, of course, given that you're right out of college.