Overworked. Vastly Underpaid. Culture Void. Behavior rots at Head.
Pros
1/ Thankfully recently acquired by much larger and more successful company. (CEO 'managed' books and value for tax purposes previously - but at least with new Owners, expectations will ensure better scrutiny, for everyone). When does tax minimisation become tax avoidance is an interesting open question for Monte Carlo..., Amsterdam..., R&D...?) 2/ Culture of Unispace is infinitely better & welcome. 3/ Local culture at DS prevailed, and each country local DS culture was created, enjoyed, embraced - until global got involved. (Every studio had its awesome vibe, despite - not because, of global leadership. Generally, smart people thrived on this, but then saw bigger picture and left. DS has a ridiculously high turnover in EVERY country it operates - the CEO cannot hide from this on his watch, but still maintains TEFLON stance - most, if not all leaver-comments, come back to global PDX management as to why they are leaving. Outdated misogynistic ethos and conservative employee-hostile policies & behaviors - just look at gender balance in management and across the company.
Cons
1/ CEO - complete lack of regular, authentic, global team communication, leadership, culture. 2/ Massive turnover globally, every office under his watch. He has nowhere to hide. 2/ CEO who pretends to also be COO, but is incompetent at both roles as frankly only understands sports, holidays, coaching during business hours, and dinners. 3/ Zero regular communications, cultural tenets or policy consistency. 4/ If you are family of CEO you are on payroll. Do nothing of value. 5/ No regular consistent process for anything, just what CEO is interested in, most likely to finance his next folly. 6/ Great people in every department, that are hamstrung to do great work, by CEO micro-management to literally approve any and every decision - autonomy does not exist and budgets that are laughable. But family travel is often on the books. 7/ The CEO is teflon. He doesn't care about people or employees, he cares about his takeaway bank balance and nepotism. Not once in my tenure did i observe him accept responsibility for anything - despite being the actual decision maker in everything. In essence, one would make a range of recommendations, he would select. But he was never interested in outcome, just teflon blame. 8/ Always screwed money-wise: underpaid from the start - well below market value; no regular reviews; no regular promotions; inclusion entitlements seen as normal by most companies, considered 'benefit' by CEO, and reduce value of overall package.