Performance bonuses are a pretty standard thing in many industries, from retail to game development, and are usually used as an incentive to encourage both frontline employees and executives to put their best foot forward for the good of the company. Many will notice that the pay offered in these bonuses, often echoing other trends like “golden parachute” severance packages, is often much higher for executives compared to other employees.
Typically, these bonuses are tied to revenue targets, sales numbers or other milestones. It’s usually assumed that financial growth in these areas will allow for the company to easily buoy pay rates temporarily, although in this latest case, that’s not what’s happened.
This particular example is a bit of a strange one as EA has revealed a weaker-than-expected financial performance for Quarter 1 of Fiscal Year 2019, which ended on March 31st. And ccording to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing on June 21st, executives at Electronic Arts have offered to place their performance bonuses into a separate pool to have it distributed to the rest of the employees.
Those involved have placed their bonuses into a fund totaling $4.8 million, to be paid out to EA employees instead. These executives include CEO Andrew Wilson, CFO Blake Jorgensen, CTO Kenneth Moss, chief marketing officer Chris Bruzzo, chief studios officer Laura Miele, and, interestingly enough, former chief designer officer and DICE CEO Patrick Soderlund.
So while EA is having a rough couple of years, this does seem to be one good thing for the employees on the forefront who often end op making far less money, and are often lacking in job security and other benefits. And with major releases like Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order set to drop this fall, the expectation seems to be that these new games and continued success will offset losses due to failures like Anthem.
Source: EA Securities and Exchange Commission filing (via GamingBolt)
