Disney Internet Group Reviews

Pros

very relaxed and friendly atmosphere
employees are treated with respect
fairly stable job
nice location

Cons

products being made do not get recognition they deserve
company is not willing to take many risks

Pros

An opportunity to work with incredibly intelligent people is never a bad thing. They recognize hard work, and sometimes your intellect.

Cons

Sometimes, because the company is so large, it can be difficult to have your opinion heard or even recognized at all.

Advice to Senior Management

Think about the little people and give them raises often or else they will leave you to go work for your big competitors.

Pros

Great work life balance. The job isn't terribly demanding.

Cons

Sucess and availalbity for advancement is tied to the sucess of the web properties. If they aren't growing, your career path won't grow.

Advice to Senior Management

This job pays much lower than the quoted industry average.

Pros

Many growth opportunities at dynamic yet stable media company, deep tradition of innovation / creativity. Very encouraging of artists and creatives.

Cons

Politics can get in the way. Takes a lot of maneuvering to move things forward or get recognition

Advice to Senior Management

Focus on creating a fair workplace. Be direct with feedback and performance assessments.

Pros

I mean its Disney, everything is a Pro. We get to be big kids here and play video games. The building holds about 150 employees so everyone knows one another. Its great!!

Cons

Just like any other corporate office, if you dont make the right friends...you'll get left behind.

Advice to Senior Management

Give promotions based on merit not just based on your relationship because those people that aren't as social more than likely are about their business and rather just get their work done.

Pros

Good balance between life and work.

Cons

Worst career move ever poor management!!!!!

Advice to Senior Management

Very poor leadership.

Pros

ESPN, Disney, ABC, ABCNews, the brand recognition. There are few companies that have the scalability issues that Disney has because it's a massive media company.

Cons

The brands are awesome and it's incredible to be associated with these brands. The upper level management is horrible. They don't watch after anyone but themselves. It's a CYA kind of environment. There's no accountability for anything that you do. There's no autonomy to do any work. It's a great place to get some experience, but, certainly not a place to work a long period of time in.

Advice to Senior Management

Learn how to innovate. Seems like upper level management would rather follow than lead.

Pros

Generally flexible works hours.
Perks, such as park tickets and discounts.
Great teamwork at the coal-face. Smart people.
The opportunity to work on high-profile web-sites.

Cons

Management is generally poor and, although they will treat you with respect, they ultimately will only see you as a resource.
Politics.
Proprietary technology stacks that make developing and maintaining a robust web-site the most painful and inefficient experience. Any marketable skills you had before you joined Disney will wither.
Politics.
Bad case of NIH (not-invented-here) and a Legal department that will prevent you from even thinking about suggesting using any open-source tools.
Politics. There are politics everywhere - but politics here are as bad as it gets.
Zero investment in your skillset. No technology training (except in proprietary tools) and no external course or conferences. If you're not on the management track then they have no interest in growing you.

Advice to Senior Management

Trust your engineers to make sound technological decisions, don't force them down paths that are driven purely by politics.

Pros

Disney brand. Very nice people to work with - they genuinely care for their peers.

Cons

DIG is an ocean of confusion, politics and ridiculous senior and executive management. There is absolutely no understanding of what it takes to succeed in the online gaming industry and a bunch of half-crazed executives running around with not one word of encouragement for the minions.

You will be punished if you make even a small mistake. You will really not be recognized for your contributions.

Staff development is not considered a priority. Work hours are insane, which works well if you're an overtime-eligible employee, but as a manager, your life is miserable.

Flex time and work from home are not really accepted unless it means that you put in 18-hour work days (working from the office and then from home).

Innovation is non-existent - if you are a senior developer, you will not learn anything new at DIG.

The long and short of it is that while some of the perks are nice, this division is not where you want to be. try to find a job at Disney Studios or Disneyland instead.

Advice to Senior Management

Remember that motivation and staff development are key to your success. I've seen some executives running around looking like they were ready to kill someone and they would actually bite off the head of the nearest person who got in their way - is this how you want to grow? Do you think this is how you are going to be successful? Is this how Walt Disney treated his people? Get with the program, guys.

Pros

The people are generally pretty friendly.

Cons

The work is terrible. The culture resists anything close to innovation, and after a significant reorganization the work/life balance that was one of the few pros to working here is gone, replaced by bad planning, terrible software design, and extra hours -- including holiday weekends. Software engineering is replaced with straight up hacking, just bang stuff out and hope for the best... and at decision time, the management drives the team to clone the legacy system.

Advice to Senior Management

This is becoming another amazon.com.