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Blizzard employees are outraged after the Q&A session, many of them are “demoralized”, and even more employees are left furious. As it turned out, the questions that were asked at the meeting were focused on the topic of “worker satisfaction” and the result of the management’s answers was not what the employees themselves expected.
Blizzard President Mike Ybarra spoke at a meeting on Thursday, which turned out to be very disappointing, causing employees to dispute the president’s statements on Twitter. Among such announcements were, for example, that management is going to evaluate employees according to “ranking by stack”, declining profits and the company’s plans to return to work from the offices. Naturally, this alignment of affairs had a very negative impact on the employees themselves, lowering their morale.
Blizzard spokesman Andrew Reynolds confirmed many of the points made during the meeting and said the company stands by Ibarra’s statements and his “leadership through difficult times.”
Reynolds also said the cut profit-sharing plan, which would see workers receive just 58% of the promised bonus, came as a shock. Given that the income, for example, of a tester is from $14 to $20 per hour (according to open vacancies) such a blow to the premium could lead to a wave of layoffs. As well as returning to work from the office did not please employees hired during the pandemic – moving from home countries and states can be extremely expensive.
Such news looks especially strange against the background of the fact that two weeks ago Activision Blizzard announced quarterly financial results, which she called the start of “strong financial performance in 2023.” At Blizzard Entertainment in particular, sales and operating profits nearly doubled – by a staggering 90% – as Warcraft, Overwatch, and Diablo raised over $100 million from pre-orders alone.
