Microsoft Cuts 1,900 Activision Blizzard and Xbox Jobs (ign.com) 72
Microsoft is laying off 1,900 workers -- or around 8% of Microsoft Gaming's 22,000 employees. The majority of layoffs are at Activision Blizzard, though cuts will impact Xbox and ZeniMax employees, too. The memo from Microsoft Gaming chief Phil Spencer: It's been a little over three months since the Activision, Blizzard, and King teams joined Microsoft. As we move forward in 2024, the leadership of Microsoft Gaming and Activision Blizzard is committed to aligning on a strategy and an execution plan with a sustainable cost structure that will support the whole of our growing business. Together, we've set priorities, identified areas of overlap, and ensured that we're all aligned on the best opportunities for growth.
As part of this process, we have made the painful decision to reduce the size of our gaming workforce by approximately 1900 roles out of the 22,000 people on our team. The Gaming Leadership Team and I are committed to navigating this process as thoughtfully as possible. The people who are directly impacted by these reductions have all played an important part in the success of Activision Blizzard, ZeniMax and the Xbox teams, and they should be proud of everything they've accomplished here. We are grateful for all of the creativity, passion and dedication they have brought to our games, our players and our colleagues. We will provide our full support to those who are impacted during the transition, including severance benefits informed by local employment laws. Those whose roles will be impacted will be notified, and we ask that you please treat your departing colleagues with the respect and compassion that is consistent with our values.
Looking ahead, we'll continue to invest in areas that will grow our business and support our strategy of bringing more games to more players around the world. Although this is a difficult moment for our team, I'm as confident as ever in your ability to create and nurture the games, stories and worlds that bring players together.
As part of this process, we have made the painful decision to reduce the size of our gaming workforce by approximately 1900 roles out of the 22,000 people on our team. The Gaming Leadership Team and I are committed to navigating this process as thoughtfully as possible. The people who are directly impacted by these reductions have all played an important part in the success of Activision Blizzard, ZeniMax and the Xbox teams, and they should be proud of everything they've accomplished here. We are grateful for all of the creativity, passion and dedication they have brought to our games, our players and our colleagues. We will provide our full support to those who are impacted during the transition, including severance benefits informed by local employment laws. Those whose roles will be impacted will be notified, and we ask that you please treat your departing colleagues with the respect and compassion that is consistent with our values.
Looking ahead, we'll continue to invest in areas that will grow our business and support our strategy of bringing more games to more players around the world. Although this is a difficult moment for our team, I'm as confident as ever in your ability to create and nurture the games, stories and worlds that bring players together.
Weaselly AF (Score:4, Informative)
We will provide our full support to those who are impacted during the transition, including severance benefits informed by local employment laws.
TRANSLATION: We will do the legal minimum.
Those whose roles will be impacted will be notified, and we ask that you please treat your departing colleagues with the respect and compassion that is consistent with our values.
Values like constantly violating the law, which is one of the things Microsoft is most known for? Maybe they're planning to do less than the legal minimum.
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A contender for the insincere apology awards. "...we have made the painful decision" - slightly less painful for Phil et al. "..they should be proud of everything they've accomplished here", as if Phil or any other top level manager would have any real idea what time and effort they've put in over the years. I'd have more respect if he just said "We're firing them because we consider our employees an expendable resource and we only care about keeping our shareholders happy"
And this, right here, is why every time antitrust regulators see a big company swallowing up smaller companies, they should say "no". Three months. They waited just three months before they slashed more than 9% of their newly combined workforce, or the equivalent of 11% of the ~17,000 people they acquired from Activision/Blizzard. (They said that a few of those people are supposedly from their existing teams, so that's maybe a slight exaggeration, but it gives you some idea of the scale here.)
The answer
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You can read it like that if you like, but historically Microsoft severance packages haven't been problematic. I suspect you'll find that in regions where the minimum is comparatively generous, their offer will get close to the minimum. But most of the time they're above average, or so sayeth a quick search on my part. I read about people being upset at being laid off from Microsoft... but not that they're being shortchanged as they are exited.
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Microsoft severance packages are quite reasonable.
Anyone who treats Microsoft employment as permanent is in for a lifetime of constant insecurity and clawing onto new positions every two years or so to avoid RIF.
layoffs are a way of life (Score:5, Interesting)
Which is why software engineers make more than truck drivers.
Because corporate America requires employees to be physically present in the office, they have to pay the mortgages of employees in prime real estate locations.
Because corporate America uses the salary system - which often requires unpaid overtime - they must pay higher salaries, regardless of whether the employees actually work the hours commensurate with their salary.
Because corporate America frequently lays off employees en masse, every employee needs six to twelve months of salary in savings - again, which increase the amount the company must pay for labor.
In other countries, where employees are guaranteed weeks of vacation time, where employment is on a contract, rather than at-will basis, where companies actually do long-term planning, software engineer salaries are typically half to a third of what they are in the US. American companies are literally paying two to three times what they would otherwise pay in salaries simply because of their own inflexibility and inability to do long term (i.e. beyond the next quarter) planning.
Re: layoffs are a way of life (Score:2)
I just need you to know that you have no idea what the word communism means.
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For these people, it's like "gay" for 13 year olds. Basically it means "I don't understand the problem but I don't like it, so I give it an attribute that I also don't understand but I've seen others use it for something bad."
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Find one place in gillbates' comment where he says anything about government meddling. Or even capitalism vs. communism. Yeah, there isn't.
I know a few software engineers (Score:4, Insightful)
Is your salary really higher if you're constantly unemployed 2-3 months at a time? Have you ever actually talked to anyone trapped in that cycle? It's not a vacation. You spend that time desperately studying to make it through job interviews. Cramming your head with crap you'll never use in the job but which if you can't answer *right*now* gets you kicked to the curb.
Meanwhile folks in other countries make much more per hour because they're not working 70 hr/wk for $105k a year.
Oh, and their pay is still pretty damn good. Your sources are using Averages to make the numbers look better in the states. A handful of insanely well paid guys working for Wall Street and silicone valley throw those numbers off. And again, strong worker protections mean they don't spend 2-3 months every year working for free training for their next job.
Re:I know a few software engineers (Score:4, Interesting)
A few years ago I ran the numbers for a career of 20 years. Turns out, when all things are considered - the overtime, the time and money spent getting a college degree:
There are exceptions, of course - the truckers making $85k working for WalMart, for example, and the boot camp coders making $33k, but overall, the opportunity cost and tuition of a college education doesn't make financial sense for those who just want to make more money. The people who end up making the most per hour worked either run their own business, or work in the skilled trades.
Because I'm doing something I like, I'm not bitter, but I can't recommend software engineering to anyone who just wants to make money. The people who just want to move from poverty into the middle class would be better served by just picking a trade and working hard. Unless you really like programming, software engineering as a career is just going to burn you out. Like anything else, the folks at the top of the pay scale love what they do, and those at the bottom hate it.
Re:I know a few software engineers (Score:4, Interesting)
"Running your own business" seems like selection bias, since if you're still in business, you haven't just launched a business,but a successful one.
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"Running your own business" seems like selection bias, since if you're still in business, you haven't just launched a business,but a successful one.
I know a plumber who started his own business and is making bank. I know a LOT of plumbers. He is the only one that could pull it off successfully.
TL;DR, most people are not fit to run their own business so stop saying it like it could be universally true. Less than 10% of any group has the type of discipline and talent it takes to run their own business. (not even going to mention luck here)
Couple problems with that (Score:2)
For college degrees, the key is being willing to apply outside your major. Tons and tons of analyst, project & business admin jobs out there, but to be
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Re: I know a few software engineers (Score:2)
Bingo. Being out on a layoff is super stressful and HR can smell desperatation and get very tough when negotiating.
Ideal interview is one where you already have a job that pays pretty well.
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Re: I know a few software engineers (Score:2)
One manager interviewing me tried to send me home with homework. To port L4ka kernel to the SoC they were using. I was very polite and didn't laugh in his face. But I also didn't dump 6-10 hours of time into a proof of concept that was theoretically going to impress him. He seemed more like the type to pick it apart or complain that it should be done faster.
Re:I know a few software engineers (Score:5, Interesting)
Oh, and their pay is still pretty damn good. Your sources are using Averages to make the numbers look better in the states.
Yes and no. On a job for job basis, even within the same company Americans do get paid better (and pay less tax to boot) for any skilled job. The difference comes into the need for that pay.
Yeah my American colleague earns 1.5x what I do. Yet when we both tore our iliacus in 2020, both went to hospital for scans, both spent months getting physio, she ended up with a $4k bill on top of her already insanely expensive health insurance while I paid zero. When our neighbours kid was born it cost them $0, childcare costs them $0, school costs them close to $0. This is all the stuff that my American colleagues are actively putting money into savings accounts in anticipation of needing in the future. That is assuming they've paid off their student loans (mine came to $0).
There's more to it than just averages (when comparing a well off European country the averages work the other way as well, Western European poor are not as poor as Americans, just like the rich aren't as rich.)
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That is hilarious. While there are a few software engineers who made their big bucks in America then moved to somewhere like Switzerland for the lifestyle, the vast majority are migrating in this direction, and an order of magnitude more would like to but can't.
Re: layoffs are a way of life (Score:2)
An employer brings in more revenue for each engineer than it does for each truck driver. My ability to make my employer money is the main reason they deal with my bullshit.
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Some context + talent hoardinge + interest rates (Score:3, Insightful)
Traditionally, companies identify a need THEN hire. Big Tech "innovated" a strategy of hiring "stem cell developers" and just hoarding all the big brains they could. I dislike this practice because as a programming veteran, I don't want a big brain...I want a specialized one. If I were running the Chicago Cubs and needed a good pitcher, I would hire the best pitcher I could find...not the best athlete in the nation and teach them how to be a pitcher. An unimpressive specialist will always do better work than an unspecialized genius...but that said...these big tech companies are titans of industry and I am just a guy with an opinion based on 25 years of looking at commits from clueless MIT/Stanford/Harvard geniuses vs specialists from state schools.
But regardless, we love to panic and maybe the sky is falling?...but this is not an indicator of that. This is an indicator of a HUGE dept downsizing by 8% after lots of acquisitions in an environment where being reckless with money is less safe than it used to be. This is not necessarily the decline of XBox, just a new norm where keeping a bloated business is more expensive than it used to be.
base ball is union with contracts so you can't com (Score:2)
base ball is union with contracts so you can't compare that to non union at will jobs.
8% seems reasonable. (Score:5, Insightful)
They just squished two orgs together. Seems very likely there's at least 8% slack as a result. The landscape isn't static, and some thing succeed while others fail. Mergers change things A LOT. A company does not exist to preserve people's employment forever.
I don't judge a company by whether or not they have to lay people off. I judge them by how they treat those people on the way out. Severance, stock vesting, bridged health care, outplacement services... if they make the effort to make sure the termination is a successful transaction, I don't think poorly of them.
I worked with a lot of people that got laid off in 2018, in an org about the same size as this division. I had lots of after-layoff drinks at bars near the company. Some people were bitter about being laid off... but nobody was complaining the packages were inadequate, or that they had been treated disrespectfully.
It is not inherently disrespectful to do layoffs. Just do it right.
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In my 46 years on Earth I have never received a severance package.
It is always go file for unemployment and get the hell out of my office. Why pay people not to work if the sole reason to let people go is to cut costs. If you pay everyone 6 months or 2 quarters then no money was saved letting them go?
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Maybe move to a real country.
Re: 8% seems reasonable. (Score:3)
Nobody will take me.
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Primarily to stay out of court. An employment contract is an actual contract, and when you are fired, the employer is breaking the contract. If you're making very little money, it's not worth suing them over termination. But as your income becomes more significant, consulting a lawyer who specializes in employment law becomes reasonable. Large companies offer severance as a way to simply avoid litigation. It's a bribe to go away quietly. Some will even up their offer somewhat if challenged on it.
Because mos
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"An employment contract is an actual contract, "
Yes, it is.
"and when you are fired, the employer is breaking the contract."
Well, that would depend on what the contract says. If the contract says something to the effect, "Either party may terminate this contract by giving proper notice to the other party" (and a lot of them do) then it's not breaking the contract at all.
Saying that the employer is necessarily breaking the contract by firing you is equivalent to saying that you are breaking the contract by q
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"equivalent to saying that you are breaking the contract by quitting."
Depending where you are, this may be true. Unless, as you noted, the contract specifies terms of dtermination. Employment contracts are binding. And "at will" employment is more complicated than it sounds. It "sounds" like a get out of jail free card for employers, but the devil is in the details.
The point is that it's easier to pay you off than it is to go to court.
Re: 8% seems reasonable. (Score:3)
My contract is "at will". And can be terminated by either party without cause. The contract does establish obligation for both parties, but paying me severance isn't one of those obligations. If I were one of the 1%, I very well might have an exit clause. But I'm simply too lowly to successfully negotiate such a thing.
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No one owes you a job. It is a right to work contract if anything.
Every contract I have signed (I am not even counting consulting/contracting) is that I can be let go at any time and i can let them go any time. However, its best to stick 2 years and give a 2 week notice and I can receive a reference.
Yes employers are worried about being sued but that is not a right. Only leadership typical gets severance and most of the time it is worth the savings not paying severance over possible legal issues.
Welcome to
Re: 8% seems reasonable. (Score:2)
Because companies have reputations and the assurance that unexpected loss of employment may occur, but that your family will be taken care of better than unemployment is a side benefit of employment.
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That is unethical. Only the shareholders and customers should be taken care of. You are robbing them essentially.
I know that sounds harsh and inhuman, but that is reality. You wouldn't want to pay $25 for a big mac meal or $50,000 for a Honda Civic because 1/3 of the cost went to terminated poor employees.
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It's hard to tell from the outside, but I agree that 8% seems pretty reasonable after folding in Activision. When you think about a company like Activision, you imagine that everyone there is making games, but this isn't the case. You've got legal, accounting, HR, IT, etc. Many of those people are redundant once Activision merges with Microsoft.
I'd be more curious to know if Microsoft used this as an opportunity to fire the poor performers in their own ranks. Given that people were let go at lots of dif
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I'd be more curious to know if Microsoft used this as an opportunity to fire the poor performers in their own ranks.
It seems so by the article, since not all people fired was from Activision.
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I don't judge a company by whether or not they have to lay people off.
Depends on why. In this case it's expected, but a lot of tech layoffs the past two years have been nothing other than poor planning by upper management. That kind of job insecurity and poor control is demoralising and a company deserves to be judged accordingly.
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Mega merging and then laying of a few thousand people - No worries! Probably reasonable! Don't judge them!
Shillllalala!
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Wow, talk about an empty and weak statement! (Score:2)
To prove this point, if an employee going through hardship, needed immediate cash, would Micros
Well... yes. (Score:3)
"Microsoft is axing people because they want a better bottom line..."
Of course.
"why are they being axed?"
Because Microsoft thinks they no longer need that work being done.
"if an employee going through hardship, needed immediate cash, would Microsoft be willing, ready and happy to hand it over, without question?"
No, and why would you expect them to? The employee and Microsoft are in a transactional relationship - "pay as you go", as it were.
I'm not sure what point you were trying to prove. If you are poin
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I suspect you're taking the position that the layoff is disrespectful as your starting point, and then judging their statements on that basis. If you abandon that pre-judgment, or at least give it a neutral weighting, the question becomes whether or not they're treating people respectfully in the process.
You can both respect the people and terminate them. These things are not necessarily antithetical to each other.
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Fair enough. It does sound like boilerplate. It doesn't strike me as being sarcastic or disingenuous... just pro forma.
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I remember being in meetings, to discuss upcoming meetings, to iron out the agenda FOR MEETINGS.
I haven't had to do it in a while, but I've been involved in a few of these "meetings to plan meetings" types of things. My only thought to add: Planning a meeting takes skill and time. One of those skills is identifying who you need input from, knowing how to get it, and being able to successfully incorporate it. How many times have you been in a meeting and thought to yourself "why the hell is so-and-so not here? This is their area."
The general guideline we used, if the meeting were intended to actually
Re: Just Say No to show (Score:1)
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Game Killer (Score:2)
Microsoft, where games go to die!
So Blizzard is going to get even worse than it is? (Score:1)
so you've been acquired (Score:2)
How many times have you heard the same BS script from a CEO - After 3 months of working together, it turns out we can fire some of you to save money! Please continue to do more work with less people, we know you're passionate and dedicated to your jobs!
Mission accomplished, competition reduced (Score:2)
This is the standard operating procedure for our monopolizing giants. Merge and cut staff to keep obedience high via the fear factor.
Then, produce less at inflated prices and jack up the top-level bonuses and stock.
Fun times again (Score:2)
More info (Score:3)
In case it isn't in the article or in case you don't already know:
Mike Ybarra left effective immediately. Looks like he was pushed out.
Blizzard cut a bunch of positions from an upcoming game called Odyssey that was just canceled.
Other cuts came from artist and animator teams.
Execution, cost cutting, layoffs. Surprised ? (Score:2)