Beyond the famous takeover by Microsoft, the Activision Blizzard group does not fail to be talked about regularly for various internal concerns. Barely a month ago, a Blizzard manager denounced the toxicity of employee evaluation methods. Last week, we learned that Bobby Kotick would retain his CEO position if the takeover does not close, but today it is the end of full-time working from home that is in debate.
The end of teleworking at ABK risks harming many employees
Over the past three years, our working methods have completely changed due to the COVID 19 pandemic. Telecommuting has become a norm and has redefined the contours of many companies that can exploit working from home without losing productivity. The video game industry is a major example, but after the implementation of full time at home for a long time, the management of Activision Blizzard has just announced that employees will soon have to return to the office. Here is what a spokesperson for the group said:
“Activision Blizzard brought teams back to the office over the past year, and on February 13, we updated our plans for the future of work. In close partnership with each leadership team, we customized a plan based on what is best for our business and our teams.
We look forward to the increased real-time, in-person collaboration and opportunity this change will foster.”
On Twitter, two users declaring themselves as ABK employees expressed their dissatisfaction and in particular LeastMyHairIsOk who castigates this decision. According to him, this will make it difficult for many employees who have selected these remote positions to choose a less expensive living environment than a big city and save in cost and transport time in particular.
“Today, Activision and Blizzard announced a return-to-office plan to employees. It will begin in April/June, according to the studio. The company will experience a significant downsizing if this occurs.
The majority of ABK employees have no interest in returning to the office, either full-time or part-time. That’s not to say that no one doesn’t see the value in a desktop environment, but overall we’ve decided that the risks don’t outweigh the benefits.
For more than a decade, low-income departments have asked management to include annual cost-of-living adjustments in salaries to avoid this, but they have been denied it, and our latest meetings last month suggest that there are no plans for that to change this year.
Two to four months is not enough for the company to change its position, even if it wanted to. Even assuming they are, that’s not enough time for those who made the hard decision to leave to uproot themselves and come back.
Leaders are unprepared for what is likely to happen – an exodus of talent who will find work elsewhere. Other tech jobs are better paid and offer WFH, and clearly our opinions on the matter are irrelevant. What interest do our employees have in staying at Activision Blizzard?”
On Reddit, it’s a certain DrHilarious_PHDallegedly employed in Activision’s quality assurance department, who claims that a number of workers “walked off the job or stopped work today after receiving news of the forced return to the office for three days a week and work virtual for two days of the week.
“Commuting is simply not possible for some, as they have taken on this remote job with the idea of working from home. They can’t commute anymore and the night shift can’t find transportation at 3:30 in the morning. »
Faced with this, several users took the opportunity to distribute what would be an internal email sent by the human resources department of Activision to all employees asking for flexibility regarding working from home.
“As mentioned in today’s town hall, Activision is asking employees to return to the office beginning April 10, 2023.
Our work model for Activision QA in El Segundo, Austin and Minneapolis requires employees to be in the office three days a week and working remotely two days a week.
The goal is for employees to be within a reasonable distance of the office for which they were hired. Therefore, there are no permanent remote work opportunities within QA.”
Whatever one may think, this delicate debate is legitimate, but it deserves very special attention. For the moment, it seems that Activision Blizzard does not act in the best way to make a transition supposed to take into account the problems of its employees.
Today, Activision and Blizzard announced a return to office plan to employees. It begins April/June, depending on the studio. The company WILL see a large Reduction In Force if this occurs. In this thread, I’m going to explain why this is a terrible idea. 1/14
— Non Biners, Drive Ins, and Dives? (@LeastMyHairIsOk) February 14, 2023
