No doubt as a response to the external pressure that's been building up over the last few months, Activision Blizzard announced to have formed a Workplace Responsibility Committee, whose goal will be to oversee all of the company's efforts to improve the workplace culture and eliminate any forms of harassment or discrimination.
This Committee will be led by Dawn Ostroff, who's been an independent director on the Activision Blizzard board since June 2020 (all the while remaining Chief Content Officer at Spotify), with Reveta Bowers (also an independent director on the board since 2018) serving on the Committee, too. Additionally, a third 'diverse' director will be added to the Activision Blizzard board.
The Workplace Responsibility Committee will reportedly require the company's management to develop indicators to measure progress and ensure accountability. Activision Blizzard's Chief Executive Officer, Chief Compliance Officer, and Chief People Officer are expected to provide frequent reports to the Committee, which will then report to the board as a whole. Last but not least, the Committe is empowered to hire external consultants and advisers, including legal counsel, to assist in their work.
As part of the settled EEOC lawsuit, the company is set to hire an Equal Employment Opportunity coordinator, who will engage directly with the Committee, the board, and another independent EEO consultant.
The press release ends with the acknowledgement that the Activision Blizzard board needs to do more to address the outstanding issues, hence the formation of the Workplace Responsibility Committee, which should facilitate workplace culture changes with 'urgency' and 'impact'.
Sadly, there's no comment at all on the recent rumor that CEO Bobby Kotick himself could resign if the harassment and discrimination culture isn't eradicated quickly enough at Activision Blizzard. Of course, there's also the little matter of Kotick's own instances of harassment and discrimination against fellow assistants coming to light through a Wall Street Journal report from last week.
Will the Workplace Responsibility Committee be enough to implement meaningful change at Activision Blizzard? One can only hope.
About the author: With over two decades of experience in gaming journalism, Alessio Palumbo has led the gaming vertical at Wccftech since August 2015. He started working at a young age for Italian websites like Everyeye.it, Gamestar.it, Nextgame.it, and Multiplayer.it before kickstarting the indie English-language publication Worlds Factory as its founder and Editor in Chief. In the last decade, he has coordinated the overall output of Wccftech's gaming section, managed PR relations, assigned reviews, produced daily news coverage, edited gaming content as needed, and delivered game reviews. Arguably, his trademark content is the long series of exclusive developer interviews that have been cited by Wikipedia and by the biggest news media and gaming publications. His passion for technology also makes him knowledgeable when it comes to gaming hardware and tech. His favorite genres include RPGs, MMORPGs, and action/adventure games.
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