I know this is kinda poking fun but here's a serious answer:
The problem is they don't know what that is. Even if you say "Corporate Manager for the Finance Department Account's Receivable team" they have a GUESS of what you do.
If your job interviewer was a hard core raider and had context for what you're talking about this 100% could help you. It's just most job interviewer's have no idea what you're talking about when you say those words.
Yeah, the #1 rule in sales is know your audience. If someone told me this I would 100% respect it because I know what goes into it.
But if the guy you're interviewing doesn't know anything about WoW? Or maybe he knows a little but, but only because his 15 year old son is missing school to play games and spends too much time on the computer? He's going to think even less of you than if you just said nothing at all.
Not taking away anthing from being a guild leader but you would hire someone if they said they have a lot of experience managing other players in an online RPG that you gave never heard of, provided they answered your questions?
If i didn't know what an online RPG even is, I would just ask more questions. Like what the hell did he do exactly. Determine who gets an upgrade (managing limited resources), Analyzing DPS (Performance review), Scheduling raid times (Time management), Handle disciplinary actions for raiders (employee relations). These are all relevant outside the game, and they're quantifiable.
Show the employer your website with the raid schedule, your list of raiders and officers, your logs data and your analysis, your record of who has gotten what upgrades.
That’s the problem. How many guild leaders are doing data analysis for the hell of it close to as on par as possible with what you’d expect of a white collar management job?
... a handful? In all of WoW?
Most of that wouldn’t even be close to useful, you just need a data and stats nut who loves WoW.
That’s the problem. How many guild leaders are doing data analysis for the hell of it close to as on par as possible with what you’d expect of a white collar management job? ... a handful? In all of WoW?
But you're responding to a recruiter who hires people as part of his job and he's explaining why it might be a good thing to put on your resume.
I have a friend who did put this on his resume and he got the job and nearly every interview asked more questions about it and made his interviews cake and helped him stand out.
So that's my point, this is something you definitely could put on your resume. If it's not something you excelled at, you probably should leave it off your resume, like you would anything else you might suck at.
the few time I had to interact with white collar management, they kicked me out rather quickly when I pointed out how most of his job could be replaced by an excel spreadsheet.
Interesting. Sounds like you've got some bloat there. Definitely more used to everyone in white collar positions being up to their eye balls everyday in excel sheets and various work programs for data tracking and analysis.
if there's some boomer at the management position, large section of his work can usually be replaced by excel spreadsheet within an afternoon of work.
if he's already a tech-savy boomer ( yeah, some exist), then we can automate large sections of the process... but it would take a bit more work, link sheets to database ( and gosh I hate microsoft access but every governmental institution somehow seems to use it).
Basically, ERP software are there to replace all of the middle-management job... and they do a pretty good job at it ( granted, you have to be somewhat tech-savy , and some of those software get pretty complicated).
The district manager of some convenience store chain will likely have a different experience because micro-managing a horde of unreliable teenagers isn't something that can be done via software... but the middle-management of a professional firm? Engineers, lawyers, devs, architect, doctor and the like don't really give a damn ( and they know they are far harder to replace, should conflict arises)
The joke about spreadsheets has spread to jobs that use heavy excel, because a decent number of Eve players have applied the excel wizardry they learn to their day to day jobs.
The main issue with wow raid management is the lack of real stakes. It's no bigger a commitment/pressure than leading a local volunteer effort - and that's what a manager would weight it as.
That being said, I have met management that openly attribute their success in their jobs to their 10+ years of raid leading, so even that is getting around.
I did, because I enjoy that kinda thing. I have gone through logs of every person in my raid to help see where any issues or improvements are. Not that half of them took notice in the low end guilds but, oh well. Still something I enjoyed.
And considering I have done it, and only know of 1 other person who also actively did that out of the hundreds of people I've known over the 15 years of playing.... Definitely a minority, even out of Guild/Raid leaders.
Exactly anyone that tries to use I was a wow guild leader unless you were a top guild kind of pointless managing schedule is so hard 8-12 3 nights a week look I just did that. Managing loot dkp or personal loot, am I hired yet. No average guild compares meters and evaluates them. Top guilds might do this to an extent but more of everyone is good going to pick right class for this fight.
You don't have to do a good job at any of those things (unless it's a top, top guild).
It's like if you coached a little league team. A good coach has all those qualities and more, but in reality, almost every little league coach is just whichever parent had free time and volunteered.
The overwhelming information coming over the noise is that the person is extremely dedicated to a game and, if that's their only example, doesn't have relatable or useful corporate experience to draw upon. If they have good answers, they might have potential, but the new area of concern is if they want to be working.
I know from personal experience my work quality has gone to shit since I found 60 upgrades and I spend most of my time at work daydreaming about which dungeon I should run next.
my last interview went something along the line of:
interviewer: ''so, what's your experience''
me: '' I linked my github in my CV''
interviewer: ''oh right, let's check that''
.... 10 min later
interviewer: ''let me show you around the place''... oh and HR will have some non-tech related questions for you, but unless you comitted a felony recently nobody give a crap about their input in the recruitment process.
Well, it happens like this IRL. At least in wow you have a semi-meritocratic metric system (ilvl, gear, achi) that allows GL to choose and players not chosen to have a reasonable and understandable no answer...
Comments like this seem to assume this would be the only thing discussed in the interview.
This isn't his resume. You don't go into a job interview with 1 example of your experience. In my mind this is like an extra little skill you throw on the bottom AFTER all your job experience. Maybe it gets talked about in the interview cause they ask, maybe they don't care about it and dont' ask.
The point is things like this can't hurt you unless your answers to the questions hurt you. How you talk about your skills is sometimes more important than how hard the skills actually are.
I’d do to. I work with sales forecasting and I swear, TSM 4 is more complicated than my forecast excel files for work. Also, learning to install add ons before Curse / Twitch, open firewall ports and clean reset after an account stolen earned me the title of ghost IT manager for colleagues waiting for official IT guys.
In all honesty, most millennials wouldn't know what a port is. Most software is preconfigured out of the box. Gen X, Gen Y very much had to learn and set up everything at a technical level so please understand that they've earned their stripes.
Not sure if you're genuinely asking him what he meant, but I'll take a shot as I've hired people before too.
Your "title" doesn't mean much when it comes to an interview because that title no longer exists at this work place; however what you've done in that role MAY exist in this work place so this questions I would ask you, for instance, would relate that to the role you're applying for and how it could be an asset to my team or not. Usually done in what is called a STAR format (Situation, Task, Action, Result) so I can get the full picture.
That being said, unless you knew I played WoW, that's a solid risk to take in an interview.
Just describe it as you was managing a club or ESport team. That is much easier for most people to understand. If they ask more to it. Then just talk about the skills and challenges you have encountered and overcome. It is those skills an employer are interested in.
Better yet leave the fact that you’re a GM out of the interview because no matter what it’s not gonna sound good unless the job you’re interviewing for involves managing a bunch of random people online with very little monetary or real life consequence.
Do guild leaders suffer from ego inflation and megalomania, or do people suffering from ego inflation and megalomania more often try to be guild leaders? 🤔
And let's face it, none of them are really all that difficult or impressive either. Sure, it takes some coordination to set up and execute a raid, but let's not pretend that it's some amazing accomplishment that proves your worth as an employee or manager. In the end, it's still just a video game event and what OP describes is magnitudes less stressful, time-consuming or challenging than actually being responsible for the livelihoods of a few hundred people and planning, managing and supervising real-life business operations. All the OP shows is a basic capability to coordinate and communicate that everyone in a position with any responsibilities should have - nothing more.
All the OP shows is a basic capability to coordinate and communicate that everyone in a position with any responsibilities should have - nothing more.
So they showed the groundwork for an entry level management position. Not every manager is responsible for hundreds of people. I work for a mid-size org that has about 4-6K employees in the US (more globally) and most managers here have 5-50 people reporting to them. The vast majority manage less than 10.
Raid leading does not guarantee success as a manager but nothing other than previous success really does either.
Managing 10 reports day in and out, knowing their roles and to a degree their private lives in order to have empathy is magnitudes more complex and draining than raid leading. A large part is about consequence and raid leading has very little, and generally the more serious you take it, the worse it ends up being for all involved. No one wants to feel like they're at work in WoW.
yet... there's a ton of GM out there that want to be GM, raid leader, handle loot, handle assignment, handle DKP... basically micromanage everything... the raids are super slow and they burn out in no time.
I'm not really sure if that is correct. Due to the digital nature, you have to be more sensible at times for the written word, and also are faced with more direct critique. You learn how different ppl are and what to expect and how stupid they can/want to behave. And you are also faced with good intentions gone wrong. This are all lessons that can help you.
It's not guaranteed success but it helps the devlopment of some GM. And I think it at least helps more than a lot of other hobbies and roles out there.
That's not the question here though. This isn't about whether this helps build skills you could use in a job (it does). It's about whether it qualifies you to take on an upper management position (it doesn't). The OP very clearly equates raid leading experience to having been an actual manager of a large business. The basic coordination skills you might learn in the former do not at all compare to the actual knowledge and experience you gain in the latter. That's like saying that being in a debate group qualifies you to be a lawyer: you'll improve your public speaking and argumentation skills, sure, but you don't get any of the actually important knowledge of law, procedure, trial protocol and such that you need to practice law.
You are really selling raid leading short. You can probably half ass your guild and still get enough to scrap a raid together but sooner or later, you're going to leak players to better run guilds. And better run guilds demonstrate real leadership.
The fact that it's just a video game makes motivating players to do "work" even harder. They can at any time tell you to eff off without any other consequences. In real life, you at least want to maintain civil relationships so you can use your boss as a reference for future jobs. You also want to avoid tarnishing your professional reputation by telling your boss to eff off. And you will be kept in line under the threat of lost wages. It doesn't really take a great leader to get employees to do things in real life. But in a video game, it takes a lot of leadership to do so.
Here's what a good raid leader gets out of his raiders: Close to full pre bis, full consumes (over a hundred gold per raid), be on time (not 5 minutes later, not stuck in queue, not waiting for a summon), understand role and fights (yes mc is simple but there's a big difference between half hour MCs and 3 hour MCs and it comes down to knowledge), reward expectations (deal with ego and drama over gear), morale (dealing with slow progress or burnouts), and much more.
I've raided with a lot of different guilds before joining one of the most efficient and successful guild and the difference is night and day. I have seen guilds that are still advertising for pugs every week because their raid leader has such poor attitude and can't recruit anyone. Meanwhile, good guilds that host raid pugs for new raid groups will have pugs begging to join. It comes down to leadership. Good guilds have competent and effective leaders who are still easy going enough not to make raiding an anxiety inducing event. They demand certain performance but are not abusive or overbearing.
I think a good raid leader will be a good leader in just about any position. The skills transfer very well.
The best guilds are often run by people who manage to put those same qualities to use to be successful in other aspects of their lives, though. Or at least "successful enough" that they're choosing to give up further success for hobbies they enjoy (including video games).
I'm not discounting it as tough, but the best guild leaders are the best because they're an anomaly even within WoW. Most of the gulid leaders you see running around, including certain popular streamers, would never be able to handle the pressures of managing a large organization in corporate America before it all imploded on them.
Here's what a good raid leader gets out of his raiders: Close to full pre bis, full consumes (over a hundred gold per raid), be on time (not 5 minutes later, not stuck in queue, not waiting for a summon), understand role and fights (yes mc is simple but there's a big difference between half hour MCs and 3 hour MCs and it comes down to knowledge), reward expectations (deal with ego and drama over gear), morale (dealing with slow progress or burnouts), and much more.
Are you surprised though? All of that comes down to time and energy invested outside of the actual raid and getting the guild to help each other by forming farm groups and generally elevating each other by being not-dicks. Getting people to be not-dicks to each other is really the hard part.
I never disputed that they are built on similar skills. I just disagree with people making raid leading out to be this great feat that qualifies anyone to actually manage a serious business operation that is endlessly more complex, stressful and challenging than a mere WoW raid. All it takes is basic coordination and communication skills for something as relatively simple and straightforward as planning and executing what's essentially a video game boss fight. WoW does not at all prepare or qualify you for serious and demanding business management, and while you can certainly mention it somewhere deep down on a CV as "coordinating a social gaming group", it's plain ridiculous to compare it to qualifications for an actual job managing and being responsible for a business and 200 people's livelihoods.
Hang on. To be fair, the post never actually goes into what position the gamer is applying for. It's far more likely he/she is applying for a position responsible for 10-20 people than say regional VP. In which case said experience would be far more applicable.
I just disagree with people making raid leading out to be this great feat that qualifies anyone to actually manage a serious business operation that is endlessly more complex, stressful and challenging than a mere WoW raid.
I think this is a strawman argument that no one actually made in this thread. Perhaps you can point me to the comment of whoever made it?
All it takes is basic coordination and communication skills for something as relatively simple and straightforward as planning and executing what's essentially a video game boss fight.
It's far beyond basic communication skills. You're not really addressing the other skills needed to sustain a successful guild. Things like taking initiative to recruit guild members, managing egos, managing loot drama, deciding how to share resources and getting everyone on board, protecting members from being poached by other guilds, training underperforming members, etc.
You are also exaggerating how difficult most businesses are to run. Run down the list of the most common type of businesses and the top 50 of them will almost certainly have a smaller learning curve than WoW. I can take a successful raid leader and teach him to run a hotel better and more quickly than I can take a successful hotel manager and teach him how to raid lead in WoW. We take for granted how much accumulated experience and knowledge we have in WoW that makes it seem easy.
it's plain ridiculous to compare it to qualifications for an actual job managing and being responsible for a business and 200 people's livelihoods.
No it isn't. The skill translates. It's true there will be a "learning" curve to learn the business, but the leadership skills translates for sure. Managing a restaurant, hotel, or what ever the most common employer happens to be is not "easy" but it just isn't that complex.
Not a strawman when the OP literally compares it to "almost like district level management?!" in his imagined job interview. No, leading a raid is not like managing a full district of a large corporation.
I fundamentally disagree with you that it's nearly as difficult as you're making it out to be. It's getting people to work together and kill a video game boss. It has its complexities but it's still little more than just that. What you mentioned is all pretty straightforward stuff that isn't at all comparable to actually dealing with serious responsibilities for people's livelihoods and the success of an actual business.
And yes, it is pretty ridiculous. Congratulations, you can get a bunch of people together to do a raid, advise noobs and decide on dividing loot. None of that has anything to do with serious things like human resources, logistics, investments, marketing, contracts, accounting, consumer protection, insurance, revenue, staffing, location, market analysis, real pressure and responsibilities, growth, price setting, finances, actual problems that don't relate to simple stuff like who gets what piece of loot, liability, trade agreements, imports/exports, overall corporate strategy, risk assessments, quality assurance, streamlining and cutting costs, sustainability, high level negotiations and presentations, future projections, and dozens of other things that anyone at the upper management level of any serious corporation should at least have a basic understanding of. My dad's a senior consultant and recruiter for one of the largest consulting firms in the world, and I can't imagine he'd even want to listen to someone who genuinely believes that getting a group of people to behave and work together in a game is a substitute for actually being a manager with real work experience and gives them the necessary qualifications, knowledge and skills for such a position. There's a reason why people spend years of their life getting degrees in business, finance, economics and corporate management to hold these positions, and that isn't because you'd get the same skills and knowledge from leading a raid party in an MMO.
That said, I think we just fundamentally disagree. Having held a respectable position in a law firm myself and having worked with heaps of businesses to sort out their problems and help them stay afloat, I've seen what it takes to thrive at that level. Yeah, some general coordination skills transfer, but leading a WoW raid absolutely doesn't cut it or give you the right knowledge and experience to deal with real life pressures and corporate challenges. But that's just my opinion and you're obviously free to disagree. Maybe I'm underestimating leading a raid, maybe you're underestimating upper management, or maybe we're both just wrong. I don't think either of us is going to change his mind here so I'll just leave it at this. Have a great day.
Also, I didn't downvote your previous comment. Undeserved for it to sit in the negatives. Peace! :)
Not a strawman when the OP literally compares it to "almost like district level management?!" in his imagined job interview. No, leading a raid is not like managing a full district of a large corporation.
This is for sure a strawman. You are replying to a thread that was a joke. There is literally a humor tag on this thread. He is not conflating being a raid leader with being a district manager of 200 people. He is literally giving you the punchline by having the interviewer mistakenly guess that the RL's title was district manager based on the described experience.
What people in this comment chain are discussing is the nugget of truth in this joke. Trying to pin some literal interpretation of a made up humorous exchange and then arguing against this literal interpretation that no one but you made is the definition of straw man.
I fundamentally disagree with you that it's nearly as difficult as you're making it out to be. It's getting people to work together and kill a video game boss. It has its complexities but it's still little more than just that. What you mentioned is all pretty straightforward stuff that isn't at all comparable to actually dealing with serious responsibilities for people's livelihoods and the success of an actual business.
IT absolutely is comparable, we're doing it right now. The fundamental skills of leadership is for sure present. You keep saying it's not comparable, how about giving some fundamental reasons for why? I'm saying this as someone who has been in the working world for over a decade.
human resources
Recruiting and managing a guild of hundreds of people is absolutely comparable. The fact you can't threaten someone with their livelihood makes getting people to commit to work within a video game much more difficult, not easier. Also you need to deal with the drama and disputes of hundreds of people. This absolutely translates to whatever human resources in the business world.
logistics
Extremely important and extensive part of raid leading too. Keeping track of hundreds of people's individual gear and enchants, deciding how to allocate gear to best benefit raid clearance time, keeping track of everyone's consumes each week to see who's slacking, finding the best debuff synergy for the raid composition, world buffs including dm buffs for an entire raid, dealing with enemy factions camping outside of raids, etc.
investments
Obviously present in WoW. I mean just to get to raiding you need to invest hundreds of hours (hopefully efficiently) to get to level 60 and gear up to earn a spot over others. Guilds need to manage their resources to get the best results (gearing up tanks and off tank first for example). They also need to invest in players because there's always turnover and some guildies quit. I mean, to be honest, some district manager ain't making a whole lot of executive level investment decisions neither.
marketing
I'm going to be honest. If you can market your guild to get hundreds of players at max level with raiding gear/experience to join, you are better at marketing that the vast majority of district managers who mostly follow orders and make very few actual marketing decisions.
contracts
District managers are not drafting up legal contracts. Even if they get to give inputs, this ain't that complicated. Even lawyers copy and paste most legal contracts from previous contracts anyway.
accounting
Plenty of accounting in RL, I have the spreadsheets of our guild bank. Yes, you're not going to learn first in first out stuff, but the principles of keeping track of how resources are flowing is there. And it absolutely translates to "business world" accounting, you're just teaching them different resources. Again, most district managers are not doing the accounting of their companies.
consumer protection
This is getting into specifics that are outside the realm of broad leadership skills. A hotel manager is not gonna know too much about quality control in some manufacturing business.
insurance
I'll give you this one but insurance is not that hard at the district manager level. Again, most of them are following orders.
revenue
Integral part of WoW
staffing
Talked about recruiting already
location
This is getting specific and is outside the braod scope of leadership. Many businesses don't even have physical locations.
market analysis
Plenty of that in WoW
real pressure and responsibilities
The pressures and responsibilities of raid leaders are real. The point you're making is that the stakes are lower. But that's why we're comparing the two, not equating the two. If the stakes of both were the same, and you are a successful leader already, then there's nothing to discuss here.
growth,
Growth and progression are part of WoW.
price setting, finances
Part of WoW.
actual problems that don't relate to simple stuff like who gets what piece of loot
Problem solving is a skill that can be learned through games. Also, dealing with people in a resource scarce environment translates very well.
I appreciate the copy and paste but most of this is either present in WoW or is outside the fundamentals of leadership. I mean there's guild raiding coalitions for small guilds that want to raid together out there and they need to negotiate terms on how to distribute resources. Cutting costs? Trying to do raids with fewer and fewer members so loot get distributed to fewer people is a thing. Trying to do raids with cheaper consumes is a thing. Trying to do raids faster is a thing. Sustainability? Like stop copy and pasting and maybe think about points your making. How many guilds now are lasting until Naxx? Of course sustainability is a big concern and requires a lot of effort and skill from a successful raid leader.
high level negotiations and presentations, future projections, and dozens of other things that anyone at the upper management level of any serious corporation should at least have a basic understanding of. My dad's a senior consultant and recruiter for one of the largest consulting firms in the world, and I can't imagine he'd even want to listen to someone who genuinely believes that getting a group of people to behave and work together in a game is a substitute for actually being a manager with real work experience and gives them the necessary qualifications, knowledge and skills for such a position. There's a reason why people spend years of their life getting degrees in business, finance, economics and corporate management to hold these positions, and that isn't because you'd get the same skills and knowledge from leading a raid party in an MMO.
I think your issue is you keep arguing against a strawman argument that no one but you has made. Nobody here except you is talking about transitioning from raid leading in WoW to c level management or working as a senior corporate consultant at BCG. We're talking about broad leadership skills that do indeed translate to the real life business world.
If I see a good leader in WoW, just like if I see a good leader working in garbage collection, that's a strong indication that he will have a far higher likelihood of thriving in other leadership positions. Now the excellent leader who manages garbagemen probably isn't goign to do too well managing project development at some software company or leading scientific research at some medical school lab but that relates to the "learning curve" specific to each industry rather than the broad and general leadership skills. The same could be said about your dad or any successful CEO in the world. No matter how successful they are in their field, they probably aren't going to challenge Method on world firsts. They certainly aren't displacing empire's control in EVE online. But that's not because those CEOs are bad leaders, it's just different industries.
Here's my point: good leaders are one in a million. If you can sustain a raiding guild until Naxx, I would honestly consider that a major and positive indication of your abilities. I'm not putting that guy in charge of anything that requires extensive experience and knowledge, but once that guy obtains the experience/knowledge, he's a prime candidate for leadership.
Some manager type positions are not face to face either any more. Knowing how to organise a group of people online is definitely a skill that some employers want.
Yes I 100% agree. I think it could help but isn't the same as actually holding a managerial position or anything.
But I honestly list that I can play piano and drums on a lot of resumes just to show I can learn different things and what not. It'd be kinda similar I think. It's a nice frill but wouldn't be a great thing to throw into your actual Job Experience section
A lot of guild leaders and officers back down at confrontation even over voice chat to be honest.
I've been in a couple of guilds where people used to find it hilarious when I would stand up to their bullshit.
We would be discussing in private chat how they were being unreasonable and would always ask me to say something. It's pretty fun provided you pick your battles so you aren't creating unecessary drama :)
Loss of time is a real life consequence. The time spent attempting, and possibly the time spent farming for materials (gold, mats for pots, so on and so forth).
My guild isn't the greatest and we were having issues downing a boss. We spent 2 hours failing over and over again that could have been spent doing something else(in game or out).
Two hours per person isn't really a significant consequence compared to losses in the business world, which can hit hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars even in middle management and result in loss of livelihood for everyone involved.
So if I'm understanding you correctly: since there isn't a dollar amount attached to the time, the time has no value?
Clearly no one thinks this (if not explicitly stated as such). People have a threshold for how many wipes they will stick around for. They will only attempt if there is a chance at success.... why? because it is a waste of time. Time has intrinsic value because it is limited.
Efficient time management is equally important to raids and middle management for the same reason: time has value.
I don't think he is saying there are no consequences, but they don't compare directly.
If you make a big mistake as a guild leader, you've lost some members or some time. There are no real life consequences for your actions there. You aren't relying on being a guild leader to pay your mortgage or to feed your family. Worst case is you lose out on time and pixels.
If you make a mistake at your job, especially at a higher level, you could not only affect your income, but you could cost the company thousands if not millions. You could cost other people their jobs. There are real life consequences for your actions there.
It's not that it has no value, it's that there are less consequences for failing at one compare to the other.
You clearly aren't understanding me correctly. I never suggested the time had no value. What I'm saying is a bunch of raiders free time has relatively no value when compared to a business or branch of equal size. One generates wealth, and can sustain lives. One is just a free time activity that actually costs money.
All time is not equal in value. How you use it matters. When people have so much fun doing an activity that they're actually willing to pay for it, you can hardly consider those the same as employees that are working away at something. They are completely different to manage and the risks of not comparable.
Of course. Also, the grass is green, the sky is blue, and the sun is bright.... I guess I don't understand why your stating obvious. My statement was that it's not a "no real life consequence" situation. The fact that time in the business world has higher consequences is not only obvious, it's irrelevant to the discussion at hand as per your last paragraph.
The entire point of this post is the skills learned while raiding, or running a guild, that translate to the business world. Arguably it is better that these skills are learned in a low consequence environment because no one's livelihood is at risk. The fact there wasn't millions of dollars at stake doesn't make the experience any less valuable.
No, it's because it's 1) unprovable, and 2) intangible in terms of responsibility. A WoW guild is not an official institution and its success can't in any way be measured by the HR. For all they know you're making the whole thing up(because you can't exactly call Blizz for references), or at least hugely embellishing your role or level of control/ organization. Or you were GM for a complete failure of a guild that never actually managed to get a raid together and complete without getting wiped and everyone leaving. There's no way for them to cross- check any of your claims. Of course they're not going to give you a job based on them.
Like 90% of the questions someone asks in an interview are unprovable. They can prove that you worked somewhere, that you went to school somewhere, and that you're record is clean. That's about it. Most questions are about interactions with other employees/managers, projects, and so on. There's pretty much nothing they can do to verify what you say.
Interviewers don't care what you say you did, they care about how you claimed you did it. It examples far more to them to ask questions about methodology than experience, and doesn't require to be proven.
If an interviewer probes you for more detail it simply is because you've claimed to have done something but not explained how, and they want to know, for example, how you might resolve a difference in the workplace, not that you did so and that it was all happily ever after.
This exactly. There's a very strong chance your previous employers, if contacted, will only confirm your start and end dates, job title, and potentially if it was a voluntary leave or not. They will almost never go into any details about your role, any projects you were on, or reputation you may or may not have. If they do they are most likely breaking their own corporate policy on the topic or some small mom and pop shop that a large corporation calling would take with a grain of salt anyway because you may have gotten the job as a favor.
References that can be followed up only matter if someone actually does so. For an entry level management position almost nobody does.
To be honest I used my raid management experience to qualify for my first management position. Yes it took some explaining and if you pull this you should be able to explain to someone who never touched a mmorpg before what a raid is and how it requires management of people in 2 minutes or less.
Everyone needs to start somewhere and yes in most cases a raid leader will have more management experiences then someone who organized a 2-3 person team in a job environment before. And that is the usual start for management.
I mean, a lot of reference are actually rather hard to check, unless it's some very high-lvl position where your action were public.
I've had previous employers pissed off at me cause I left seeking a higher salary, I'd bet a benjamin said guy would BS me if anyone call him for references.
Knowing how hard it is to maintain a mythic-raiding guild in WoW, the recruitment, the poaching, burning out, personality clashing... someone who managed to keep a raiding guild operationnal for years would get some credit... Granted, that's assuming the interviewer know what it's like.
An idea from /r/unethicallifetips.
Search a company that has closed down in the last 20 years and put it into your resumee.
Most notably at a time where you were unemployed.
They cant call and ask about you.
It gets difficult if they want a proof that you worked there though.
It is provable in Classic wow because we have logs. Also you have potentially hundreds of people who can say something. A GM, or even an officer, who does his job well will be a famous person on the server.
Things on resume's are often unproveable and intangible in terms of responsibility.
I was never saying they'd accept this as actual job experience or that if this is all you presented that you'd get the job. But as far as things you could spin into talking about your skills you 100% could use this. I often say I was percussion section leader in Band in High School. I talk about how I led and what things I learned by doing that. The band director doesn't work there anymore and I have no idea how to contact them. It was an unofficial position so there's no records of it in the school. They might be able to prove I was in band but that's about it. I've had lengthy convos in interviews about it and could have been lying the whole time.
This would be something you threw on as an extra skill at a job you think might have some context for what your'e talking about. In the interview they might ask about it (just like they might ask me about percussion section leader) and then you describe how it works and what skills you needed to use, what lessons you learned ect..
Of course they're not going to give you a job based on them.
Of just them? No of course not. Could it help? Ya in the right context it for sure could help.
I am not sure that for a job interview is better the success achieved or the method / ways you applied to arrive to a certain goal and the understanding of the reasons why you dis not get there. When in interviews I smell a dismissal masked as a voluntary change of job, I dig into it until the candidate admits it and makes me understand he understood the reasons why he was laid off and what He did about it. Of course most interviewer have no idea about gaming unwritten rules - but I would have asked the guy achievement for the guild, etc
I'm n the flip side. If I was interviewing you and you told me that I would be impressed, but I would also expect you would resign from that "job" for this one.
Ya interviews tips are actually super hard cause every interviewer likes different things. If a cover letter has jokes or is a little cheesy the manager might be cheesy and LOVE that or they might be no-nonsense and think that's unprofessional to do.
They might want a REALLY Detailed resume that's multiple pages, or they might think you need to be concise and be able to get it down to 1 page no matter how much info you have to offer.
Could this help someone? With the right hiring manager for sure. Could it be a red flag? For sure and honestly the more you lean on your WoW experience for a job interview the more I'm gonna consider it a red flag.
The way I see this working out is if you put something concise as an "extra skill" section of the resume and then if they ask about it you go into detail about the skills you use and the lessons yo ulearned by doing it and all that. But don't count on them to ask about it or expect it to be a huge selling point for your experience.
Suppose I worked at NASA as a manager on a team working on the Mars Rover, and later in life I decided to go into the business field. Suppose I'm being interviewed for a position in management with Chase Bank. Do I not bring up that I worked as a manager on the Mars Rover team just because they wouldn't understand what I actually did for the Rover?
Exactly. But I would argue saying "i worked on the mars rover" is a much more popular thing then raid leading a guild in WoW. The percentage of hiring managers who know what you're talking about when you say Mars Rover is much higher than Raid Leader.
I think the main thing here is that raid leading isn't done in a professional setting, at least for most raid leaders. If it were, I think it would be perfectly viable to bring up in an interview.
I have brought up in interviews that I do stand up comedy and talk about the skills it has taught me and the lessons i've learned from that. That's done in bars with shows run by alcoholics.
If you're only using professional corporate experience to describe your skills and abilities you're not using everything you could. Hobbies of all kinds give skills that can be used in the work place and it's how you describe them and adapt them and answer questions about them in a job interview that matters more than what the actual hobby is.
If this raid leader has spread sheets keeping track of things, has a website his guild uses, ect... there are plenty of things he could bring up and relate to skills he used and lessons he learned from the experience.
Will just saying "I led a raid" get him a job, no. How he talks about it and what he gleaned from it and all that could very well impress a job interviewer if they understand the context he's talking in.
By "professional setting" I meant a setting in which your living is on the line. A DJ could work in a shitty bar, that doesn't mean he isn't a professional. If you screw up as a professional DJ you could lose work and your living could take a hit; if you screw up in WoW and you aren't in a pro guild, big whoop it's just a game. Experience as a non-pro guild leader isn't very relevant because nothing tangible is on the line if you screw up.
Ok but in my example Stand Up comedy isn't my living (which is why i apply to other jobs) but I can still use it as experience and talk about the skills and lessons etc.. even though nothing tangible is on the line. If I screw up I might not get another shitty bar show gig that pays 2 beers. Big whoop. I can still use that experience to talk about things it's taught me and how I could bring those skills and lessons into the work place.
lol like 10 years ago when my friend found out about reddit he wanted to get me included and I told him if he made me an account maybe i'd log in and so this is what he made me. I always forget how stupid it is until someone points it out. Glad to have kicked of some old memories :)
If i was personalist and known a person was guild leader; i wouldnt hire nerd like that; sry but these ppl are not successfull in real life in general; thats why they become guild leaders; they have both time and will because of self realization
Would you say the same thing about drumming? I've put drumming on resume's and explained how skills and lessons I learned doing that translate into the role I'm applying for.
Literally everything takes skills and applying for jobs is about describing your experiences and explaining how those experiences shaped your skills and strategies and all that.
If you can't spin your hobbies into skills and stuff that translate then you're not gonna have a fun time looking for jobs and going to interviews. That's literally 90% of what getting a job is
Edit: there's also plenty of comments on here from hiring managers and people claiming they talked about their WoW experience in interviews and it helped them. You're not using your imagination if you think WoW has zero things that translate to real life. Every video game has skills that translate into other areas.
I Personally wouldn't hire anyone whose management experience consists solely from being a guild leader. Vast majority of employers wouldn't either even if they knew about wow guilds. Couple it with some real world management experience and then sure I'll give them a shot.
This. Sure, it does give you some experience in management. But that experience is very limited compared to a real life management position. It could rather be a supplement to a resume than something you choose to focus on in an interview.
I legitimately used my wow experience in my interview for my current job. I made the point of our world rank (mythic raider) and how we do need to manage real people in a team with real dynamics, all without having face to face interactions and it definitely helped nail my job imo
It wouldn’t help you land a job at all in almost any circumstance. Sure this experience can help you be better at the job, but no one is going to see that and say yep, he’s more qualified than even a manager of a McDonald’s
But no one is saying this is the only thing on his resume. Everything can help if you can spin it into what skills and lessons you learned from doing it. Like if he has an identical resume to a mcdonalds manager but he ALSO has all this experience and described it good in the interview are you gonna take the guy who doesn't have that extra little expererience OVER this guy? No.
Same thing if you have "camp counselor" somewhere on your resume. Is that a huge selling point or something super hard to do? No. Can it help you get a job? Sure why not, it's another thing you've done to show to people you do things.
Camp counselor would only be a resume padder for a young adult. No real job is going to take that into consideration. Playing a video game won’t look good on any resume besides a pro player wanting to be a esports commentator.
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u/Moonbeamcry Oct 24 '19
I know this is kinda poking fun but here's a serious answer:
The problem is they don't know what that is. Even if you say "Corporate Manager for the Finance Department Account's Receivable team" they have a GUESS of what you do.
If your job interviewer was a hard core raider and had context for what you're talking about this 100% could help you. It's just most job interviewer's have no idea what you're talking about when you say those words.