Walt Disney Imagineering Reviews

Current Employee – been working at Walt Disney Imagineering

Pros – Great to work on projects recognized around the world and unique design challenges.
Generally most co-workers are very pleasant people and make for a good work environment.

Cons – Employees are treated as expense centers and receive few perks.
Favorites are played over talent and experience.
Out-dated hiring practices don't allow fresh talent to come on board very easily.

Advice to Senior Management – Stop stringing along employees as contractors and temporary hires if you want moral and quality of work to improve. When contractors do just as much work (if not more) than full time employees but are denied access to perks and benefits it creates a 2nd class work environment.

Current Employee – been working at Walt Disney Imagineering

Pros – Interesting place to work - great co-workers and interesting work

Cons – Not a lot of room for vertical growth

Advice to Senior Management – Acknowledge good work more often - not just with words but also promotions

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Walt Disney Imagineering

Pros – Great people (some excellent friends here) combined with work that is both truly interesting and diverse makes the days fly by. There are plenty of opportunites for creative problem solving and employees take a great deal of pride in the end product. The name recognition of Disney is fun for friends and family.

Cons – Incentive structures and salaries of the rank and file are terrible. HR seems to have all the power and managers cannot get their folks promoted. The industry comparables used by the company are absurd compared to the level of expertise required here to do the job and the unpaid overtime that comes with most roles.

Advice to Senior Management – We need a longer run game plan for grooming future leaders. Mentorship programs do not work when no project will pay for a mentee to do real work in addition to subject matter experts (already on the project) who are capable of doing work alone.

Former Employee – worked at Walt Disney Imagineering

Pros – During my time at Imagineering, I worked on some interesting projects that are now enjoyed by millions of people, I traveled to fascinating foreign countries and lived there for weeks or months, some of my co-workers were good and generous people, and I was able to contribute meaningfully to some high profile attractions.

Cons – The politics and backstabbing was unreal, and unmatched by any other employer I've worked at, and seemed to pervade most departments that I witnessed. There were a number of people who frankly were either incompetent, or had outlived their usefulness decades ago. Imagineering is a company that can only thrive by being innovative, and creating new technologies and wonderments . Sadly, there is a tremendous reticence that has settled over Imagineering for several decades now, stifling new ways of thinking.

Imagineering truly needs an infusion of new blood, and a strong clearing out of "deadwood" which has caused creative and technological stagnation. Several of the "legends" of Imagineering turn out to be folks who give a great speech, but are patently uncreative, stealing ideas from others, taking credit for pitches that were not their own, and failing to see potential in new kinds of entertainment. They often give lip service to "storytelling," but rarely create good stories for their attractions.

Advice to Senior Management – Walt created WDI with artists from his animation studio. These were people who had spent their professional careers honing their understanding of entertainment from animated movies, which gave them insight into story, staging, characters, personalities, and narrative flow.

Today's Imagineers are often hired from Illustration schools like Art Center. These people can render beautiful paintings of environments, but have no feeling for character, personality, pathos, or real storytelling with plot structure. As a result, today's Imagineering produces incredible environments with no inhabitants. Sadly, when Marc Davis retired, attractions focussing on characters disappeared. There was no one to pick up that mantle. Imagineering needs more Marc Davis, and a little less Claude Coats. Incredible landscaping is only so impressive, unless there are stories that we can relate to.