Valve have been previously praised for their boss-less, so-called 'flat structure'. Along with the leak of the new employees handbook and the release of many much loved games such as Half-Life and the Portal franchise and Team Fortress 2, this structure has added to the company's idealised image within the gaming community.

However the recent layoffs in February of this year have further piqued interest in how the company actually works. Jeri Ellsworth, one of 5 fired that worked on augmented reality technology at Valve, tweeted about being let go at the time though didn't go into detail. Until now.

Whilst being interviewed by the Grey Area Podcast, Ellsworth talked about her time at the Seattle based company, about the CastAR system (a projected augmented reality game system) she'd worked on and on top of this she revealed a bit more about the inner workings of Valve.

Ellsworth called into question the belief that Valve works under a 'flat structure' describing it as more of a 'Pseudo-flat structure'. She explained "There is actually a hidden layer of powerful management structure in the company. And it felt a lot like High School. There are popular kids that have acquired power, then there's the trouble makers, and then everyone in between. Everyone in between is OK, but then there are the trouble makers who want to make a difference."

She recalls how she struggled to get her fellow employees interested in the CastAR project and, as a result, how her team were "starved of resources". She spoke of how her attempts to hire a machinist that would manufacture machine parts at $40,000 a year were obstructed. She elaborated, "I was struggling trying to build this hardware team and move the company forward. We were having a difficult time recruiting folks. We would interview talented people but they would be rejected by the old timers at Valve as not fitting the culture. I shouldn't say the numbers, but there were very few folks in the hardware department. We were understaffed by a hundred times for what we needed to do."

You can watch a hands-on video demonstration of the CastAR system above.

In the interview Ellsworth talks about the day she was fired and how she found out from a colleague and not Gabe Newell himself. She admits, "I'm sounding bitter, and I am. I am really, really bitter because they promised me the world and then back-stabbed me."

She continued, "What I learned from Valve is I don't think it works. You give people complete latitude with no checks and balances, it's just human nature they're going to try to minimise the work they have to do and maximise the control they have.

"Valve was really good at hiring lead guitarists, we would always say. All us hardware folks, we went out and got the best makers and creators, but we were all lead guitarists. We didn't have the person who would just sit there and assemble things for us. Even getting a tech for around the lab was almost impossible. That's where a layer of management can help organisations."

However there was a positive aspect to Ellsworth's departure from the company in that Newell allowed her to take what she'd developed of the CastAR system and do what she wanted with it. Presently Ellsworth is working with Rick Johnson, another former Valve Engineer, towards the goa of making the CastAR system a true reality at some point in the future (a Kickstarter in aid of this may pop up in the future. Watch this space).

Finally Ellsworth says she has remained friends with several Valve employees, "I should frame this with, I have a lot of friends at Valve. There are some great people there, especially in the hardware team. We were really close-knit. We were probably the hardest working people in the company."