In a brand new and albeit embarrassing interview with Variety, Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick stated there’s truly by no means been an issue with “systemic” harassment on the firm, and that reviews of such issues have been primarily the results of unions attempting to trigger hassle.
2021 was a very bad year for Activision Blizzard. In July of that yr, California’s Division of Truthful Employment and Housing—now often called the Civil Rights Division—filed a lawsuit alleging widespread discrimination and sexual harassment on the firm; that was adopted by different investigations, the departure of quite a few high-level workers, apologies, fines, a number of extra lawsuits, and vital pushback from workers, who based the ABK Workers Alliance to assist drive unionization efforts and convey about different significant change on the firm.
Regardless of all of that, Activision Blizzard’s board of administrators stated in June 2022 that, after conducting its personal inside investigation, there was no evidence of systemic gender-based misconduct on the studio. Now, Kotick shouldn’t be solely sticking to that story, he is taking it a step additional by pointing the finger at labor organizers.
“We have had each doable type of investigation finished,” Kotick stated. “And we didn’t have a systemic concern with harassment—ever. We did not have any of what have been mischaracterizations reported within the media. However what we did have was a really aggressive labor motion working exhausting to attempt to destabilize the corporate.”
That is actually audacious, however it suits a brand new method Kotick is outwardly taking: He informed Selection that his mistake when the allegations about widespread misconduct at Activision Blizzard first got here to mild was not forcefully defending the corporate and himself towards them. “I would not be sitting right here speaking to you if any of what you learn within the inflammatory narrative was truthful,” he stated.
Sarcastically, Kotick additionally insisted that he’s not “anti-union,” and actually claimed that he is “the one Fortune 500 CEO who’s a member of a union.” That may be SAG-AFTRA, the union representing movie and tv actors, journalists, and different associated trade professionals, which he joined in 2011 after being forged as Oakland A’s co-owner Steve Schott within the Brad Pitt movie Moneyball.
“If we have now workers who desire a union to symbolize them, and so they consider that that union goes to have the ability to present them with alternatives and enhancements to their work expertise, I am all for it,” Kotick stated. “I’ve a mom who was a trainer. I’ve no aversion to a union. What I do have an aversion to is a union that does not play by the foundations.”
The file would appear to point in any other case. In January 2022, as an illustration, Activision Blizzard refused to voluntarily acknowledge a union shaped by QA testers at Name of Responsibility studio Raven Software program; it wasn’t till June of that yr that it changed direction, not lengthy after Microsoft—which is in negotiations to accumulate Activision—stated that it will not oppose the union if and when it takes over. In October 2022, the US Nationwide Labor Relations Board discovered that Activision Blizzard had withheld pay raises at Raven in retaliation for his or her roles in union group; in January 2023, staff at Activision Blizzard studio Proletariat introduced that they’d dropped their request for a union vote as a result of studio CEO Seth Sivak was “making a free and fair election impossible.”
The Communications Staff of America, the labor group that is been main recreation trade unionization efforts, rejected Kotick’s characterization. “Companies select to be disruptive after they run anti-union campaigns,” CWA communications director Beth Allen informed Selection. “Staff who be a part of collectively to enhance their workplaces intend to make constructive adjustments for the good thing about all. When employers voluntarily acknowledge unions and interact in good religion contract bargaining, it builds belief and strengthens firms.”
Activision Blizzard has additionally beforehand acknowledged that misconduct on the firm is in actual fact an issue. In March 2022, as an illustration, it paid $18 million to settle a sexual harassment lawsuit filed towards it by the Equal Employment Alternative Fee. Different lawsuits stay in movement, however Activision Blizzard has begun pushing again on that entrance too. In December 2022, it filed a lawsuit towards California’s CRD alleging that the company had moved improperly slowly with the case and withheld data relating to its contact with media and unions.
In late 2021, PC Gamer spoke to three ex-Blizzard employees whose tales additionally disagree with Kotick’s claims: They stated amongst different issues that inappropriate office behaviour, fuelled partly by an out-of-control ingesting tradition, was excused by administration, and that ladies of their departments struggled to obtain the identical recognition as males.
Kotick additionally touched on Microsoft’s in-the-works acquisition of Activision Blizzard, saying that “Microsoft is by far the most effective place for us to be” and that the deal makes significantly good sense in mild of the rising price of recreation improvement, particularly “compensation for expertise.” However he added that the corporate will in all probability be okay if the acquisition is in the end blocked: Activision Blizzard is at the moment sitting on roughly $12.6 billion in money, and can acquire one other $3 billion on high of that from Microsoft as a penalty if the deal falls by.
