Benjamin Janssens · @benjiJanssens
25th Jul 2019 from TwitLonger
My experience at Ninjas in Pyjamas
In May 2016 I started working for Ninjas in Pyjamas as a community manager. I was responsible for the communication between Ninjas in Pyjamas and the Benelux fanbase via Facebook (private messages, translations, comments,...)
I applied for the job and only found out about the fact that it's a volunteer job after I got accepted, but I was happy with the chance and knew that it would be a huge kickstart for my personal career in esports as I was never involved in anything esports back then. I was reviewing games and writing articles about them.
I must say I got a €150 coupon in their merch store on Christmas though.
But I didn't just stop there. I also took all of the other communication via Facebook in my hands, which is a lot, especially considering they had just hit 1 million likes back then.
I spent nights just to interact with our fans, all voluntarily, but there was one problem: I knew about just as much information as all the other fans and everything else was kept secret from me.
But apparently I did my job well. Everyone was happy and I got asked to work at ESL One Cologne 2017 for Ninjas in Pyjamas to manage their social media and event coverage. Of course I took that chance in a heartbeat. But then several days beforehand I asked questions about the hotel and travel, only to find out that I had to pay for a hotel and travel myself, just to work there for them, also voluntarily.
Another thing that has always been on my mind is the amount of credit I received. No-one ever told me I was doing well or not. On the contrary: the only time I ever heard someone was when I typed a spelling mistake. I wasn't even mentioned on the website on the staff page and what made me feel the most under-appreciated I ever have was when they released a happy Christmas video with "all of the staff members", except for me. And this doesn't just count for me, this counted for every volunteer. There was a clear separation between "working in the office" and "working as a volunteer".
Eventually, after a lot of complaining, I got put on the site. For a week and then they removed me again.
In July or August suddenly my permissions to manage their Facebook page got revoked. I asked the CEO of Ninjas in Pyjamas what was going on and he told me I didn't have to worry, that they were only "cleaning up". The person responsible for their social media back then on the other hand told me that they were going to keep social media inside the office and he was right: I never got my permissions back and got a message in September of 1 sentence, which was copy-pasted to several other volunteers, that I got kicked because they didn't need me anymore. I then went and mailed the CEO of Ninjas in Pyjamas. We were going to figure something out that I can still help with, but I never heard back since.