Bobby Kotick considers resigning if workplace problems aren’t fixed soon [UPDATE]

Update: 11/22/21 7:20 a.m. Central: Follow The Wall Street Journal via GamesIndustry.biz, Bobby Kotick held a meeting with top executives to discuss the state of Activision Blizzard in the face of recent controversies and allegations. The CEO told his colleagues he would consider stepping down if countermeasures taken to combat the developers’ criminally toxic work culture failed to address the issues. problem “at a fast pace”. The news comes days after the company’s shareholders called for Kotick’s resignation. As a result, several executives Kotick spoke with last week insisted that some employees wanted him gone. A “workplace excellence committee” is underway, but whether Activision Blizzard’s working conditions will change for the better, or whether Kotick will be true to his word about his resignation, remains to be seen. must watch.

Update: 11/18/21 2:00 pm Central: We learned through Shannon Liao’s report at washington articles that Activision Blizzard employees have begun signing an open petition for CEO Bobby Kotick to resign from his position at the company. At the time of this update, more than 500 workers have registered their names in recommend, read“We, the undersigned, no longer have confidence in Bobby Kotick’s leadership as the CEO of Activision Blizzard.” The team’s request was brief and simple, stating, “We ask that Bobby Kotick resign himself as CEO of Activision Blizzard and that shareholders be allowed to choose a new CEO without investment. input from Bobby, who we know owns a substantial portion of the shareholder’s voting rights.” According to data from 2020, Activision Blizzard uses somewhere in the ballpark with 9,500 people, which means This petition currently represents more than 5% of the workforce.

Original story: Yesterday, The Wall Street Journal released a report detailing evidence that Activision CEO Bobby Kotick was aware of the company’s long history of sexual misconduct. The report also indicates that Kotick kept information about these events from management and brought up allegations of abuse filed by Kotick himself. You can read the full story here, but the revelations caused an outcry across the industry, leading to more than 100 Activision Blizzard employees holding an impromptu walkout yesterday demanding Kotick’s resignation. Now it seems a group of shareholders are echoing the same sentiment.

washington articles published a story revealing that several shareholders, led by the Strategic Organization Center (SOC) Investment Group, had written a joint letter to Activision’s board of directors demanding Kotick’s resignation. The letter also demanded the resignation of two of the board’s longest-serving members, Brian Kelly and Robert Morgado. Kelly, who joined the company in 1995, serves as chairman of the board. Morgado has been with Activision since 1997 and serves as the lead independent director.

These shareholders have asked Kotick, Kelly and Morgado to step down by December 31. Otherwise, the group vows not to vote for the re-election of the current board members at its annual shareholder meeting on next June. SOC told Post that current Activision management has repeatedly failed to promote a safe work environment for all employees and that the company needs “a reset button on the board”. Among their replacements, the group wants to appoint at least one non-executive employee of Activision Blizzard and wants a more diverse board of directors overall.

Several investment groups signed on to the letter and, overall, account for 4.8 million shares of Activision’s nearly 779 million shares outstanding. SOC Investment Group is a company that works with union-sponsored pension funds and, in its own words, “holds corporations and their management accountable for irresponsible corporate conduct.” and unethical as well as overpaying executives”. SOC has previously objected to Kotick’s substantial earnings, is one of the highest among US executives.

It should be noted that Activision’s board of directors issued a statement yesterday to reply WSJThe report said “remains confident that Bobby Kotick appropriately addressed the workplace issues that brought him to his attention.” Kotick sent a transcribed video messages for Activision Blizzard employees to call WSJReport of “inaccurate and misleading.”

[Source: The Washington Post, Wall Street Journal via GamesIndustry.biz]