Der Jason meldet sich wieder:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features ... re-lawsuit
Er macht es v.a. an der Rockstar-Attitüde fest, die sich nach den frühen Erfolgen entwickelt haben soll.
Blizzard management set the tone by hiring mostly men, stoking their egos and often overlooking or being unaware of misbehavior, current and former employees said. Many executives were also dating lower-ranked employees. Morhaime, who ran the company for 27 years, courted and then married a Blizzard business director in 2010. Another founder, Frank Pearce, left his wife for a Blizzard customer service representative, and they wedded in 2012. J. Allen Brack, the outgoing president, also married a lower-level employee.
Those relationships were consensual, but they set a precedent that made some female employees uncomfortable, the women said. That dynamic, combined with testosterone-fueled arrogance and heavy drinking that were a regular part of office culture, led to frequent and often unwanted sexual advances. Cher Scarlett, who worked at Blizzard for a year starting in 2015, said she was groped by male co-workers at two company parties. “It didn’t even occur to me I should report this behavior,” she said, “because in my mind this behavior was normal and protected here.”
Das sei jedoch nicht immer so gewesen, die Anfangsphase werde als Zimmer von introvertierten Nerds beschrieben:
Blizzard was founded in 1991 by three men. Early employees, almost exclusively male, were bookish and introverted. Those days were less of a drunken party and more like the inside of a teenage boy’s bedroom. Desks were adorned with pictures of scantily clad women, and designers drew characters with large breasts and little clothing, recalled one of the few women there at the time. A video created for the company’s 10th anniversary condescendingly describes the “easy laugh” and sister-like qualities of Blizzard’s first female employee.
V.a. durch den Megaerfolg mit World of Warcraft soll sich dann ein Mentalitätswechsel vollzogen haben:
Christine Brownell, who worked at Blizzard from 2003 to 2005, said she was never harassed but noticed a change in a portion of her colleagues once World of Warcraft took off. Some got profit-sharing bonuses the size of their salaries, she said, and fancy cars suddenly populated the parking lot. “Their ego filled the room,” Brownell said. “They thought so much of themselves and what they had done.”
[...]
This marked a turning point for Blizzard, and for its culture. Some male employees began to see women at the conventions not just as customers but as groupies. One woman who worked there recalled a conversation in which one of Blizzard’s top executives told a group of his staff that young women—both fans and colleagues—saw them as superstars, and why shouldn’t they benefit sexually from that? “They have these legions of fans swarming around them just because they are known figureheads in the community. And they’re abusing their power like that to take advantage of these fans and their co-workers,” said Mikkonen, a former Blizzard community manager.
Und vor allem in der Technologie-Abteilung unter Ben Kilgore habe es ein Alkoholproblem gegeben:
Many of the most grotesque descriptions of misconduct in California’s lawsuit were about Blizzard’s technology department, current and former employees said. Kilgore, the longtime head of that group, was Morhaime’s planned successor but didn’t share his boss’s understated demeanor. Two former employees said they saw Kilgore touch female colleagues inappropriately at work functions. The legal complaint described claims of Kilgore’s misbehavior, identifying him only by his job title.
Technology staff sometimes got drunk during work hours or showed up hungover; they vomited in trash cans and held after-work hazing rituals where new recruits were expected to take shots of liquor every half hour, former employees recalled. Finally, in 2019, Blizzard enacted a “two-drink maximum” at after-work functions to stave off some of the problems and cut down on drunk driving.
Dass sich dann nach Morhaimes Abgang die Activision Führung stärker in Blizzards Interna einmischte, soll keine positiven sondern eher noch mehr negative Auswirkungen gehabt haben, zu den oben geschilderten Problemen kam dann noch Stress und Angst um den Arbeitsplatz hinzu, Activision wurde als "Auge Saurons" umschrieben:
Current and recently departed employees said that, rather than eliminate the sexist culture, the added oversight has only exacerbated Blizzard’s problems. Activision has pushed Blizzard staff to hit unrealistic deadlines and do more work with fewer resources, increasing stress and overtime across all levels.
[...]
Some Blizzard staff refer to Activision as the Eye of Sauron. With budget cuts constantly looming, managers of each department have jockeyed for resources. As a result, some are reluctant to report internal problems and risk drawing unwanted attention to their teams from corporate overlords, current employees said.
