Roblox

The engineering bar is high. The problems that you can work on are interesting and impactful. People love Roblox, and kids think you're a celebrity.

Over the past few years, the culture that made Roblox a fun place to work at (we are a gaming company, right?) had been gutted and removed. It used to be that people could work on something they thought could be a good idea, try it out, and be okay if it didn’t work out. The bar became “be perfect at delivering a sometimes vague ask” at many costs. There is little ownership over the ideas to execute on. This means that unless the leader who came up with the idea is very clear with you, you are left with the responsibility of both not misunderstanding them and anticipating their preferences, ahead of delivering on them. But of course, nobody is perfect.

Management seems to have then become increasingly focused on protecting against bad optics to leadership, like a learned behavior of helplessness. Over time, that means the burden of execution lands squarely at the bottom of the line, the individual contributors they manage. I have been in more meetings and interactions over time that indicate to me that this culture of stepping around eggshells is pervasive. Managers have a lot of power though, so the ones who can frame and gaslight the best, even while throwing some of their reports under the bus, get rewarded for being “the good followers”.

The idea that managers should protect their teams from bad upper management, a bible responsibility of a good engineering manager, is not the case here, and sadly it is understandably so.

The result is that my colleagues confide in me privately but are different publicly. This is a sad evolution of the Roblox I loved to work at when psychological safety seemed better valued.

I am not aligning anymore because I like ownership, autonomy, and creativity in what I do, and I don’t want to keep feeling like I have to walk around eggshells and deal with “what will leadership say next?” as if my job depends on it.

I have also noticed people working more evenings and weekends without being able to push back.

You have inherited or become part of a culture of fear and micromanagement that will siphon your best talent away to other places that can encourage creativity and product thinking better. The natural tendency will be for you only to retain single-dimension followers. If that's what you want, then okay, but the people who are more intrinsically motivated by autonomy and purpose will leave. Those people are studied to be the highest performers, and they will have options beyond Roblox to satisfy more of their career needs.

I think management should take that seriously and not ignore the culture. Company culture is invisible, but it is strong and powerful. Your best future for Roblox could come from a divisive thought in an employee who is now too afraid to contradict their management, but with a fear-based culture, you will never know. Don't shoot yourselves in the foot.