“Management lied to me and refused to help me” An artist explains why he slammed the door on this video game giant

Gaming News “Management lied to me and refused to help me” An artist explains why he slammed the door on this video game giant

“They don’t care about people.”

Activision Blizzard has often been highlighted on social media or in the specialized press. Bobby Kotick’s antics and Jason Schreier’s revelations have regularly brought the video game giant into the spotlight. While the company has just been taken over by Microsoft, opinions are becoming looser. After the former manager no longer leads the company, some employees are afraid to talk about their bad experiences. This is the case of Chris Sayers, a VFX artist who worked on Overwatch 2 at Blizzard.

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After thanking the people he worked with on his team, he describes them as “warm, welcoming, funny, friendly and so talented“Chris reveals that this wasn’t enough given the stress of having to achieve something”four jobs at onceAnd he faced management that “made promises it didn’t want to keep,” which pushed him to slam the door. He explains in a series of messages how Blizzard “Don’t care about people“, in his words.

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It all starts in July 2023. Chris Sayers has been working on the cosmetics team on Overwatch 2 for 6 months when Blizzard offers him a manager position. The young man agrees with the group about the numerous benefits expected and the salary. Everything quickly becomes official and despite his new responsibilities (responsibility for three people, managing the outsourced VFX pipeline in China, etc.), Chris is proud to climb the ladder. But the problems begin in the first week at his new job. Blizzard, despite Chris’ disagreement, wants to fire one of the team members who is telecommuting (to care for his sick parents, as he states). Then comes the problem of salary. After several reminders, the VFX head realizes that his salary will be less than 50% of the other VFX heads in the studio, “So much so that my salary as a lead is lower than anyone else I manage“, he explains in a message. The HR department’s reaction will make his blood run cold.

“I was told this is because I live in the UK and my salary is based on market value, not my own worthsays Chris Sayers. “Why pay yourself more than you have to? That doesn’t mean anythingBlizzard would have responded. “I realize I’m talking to a person who doesn’t care about people“ regrets the young man. The worst is yet to come. Since there is still no raise, the VFX head threatens to resign from his position. A phone call to HR will bring him down from above as they pretend not to know about his promotion. “I then filed an official complaint” he explains. “The formal complaint investigation returns a few weeks later and, after careful consideration, concludes that HR did nothing wrong and followed all procedures correctly. So about an hour later I handed in my resignation“, he wrote on X/Twitter.

The story could have ended here, but Chris Sayers carries on. “HR then tells me that because of my leadership role, I have acquired skills that would expose me to business risk if I worked elsewhere. So they activate a non-compete agreement that prevents me from working ANYWHERE for 3 MONTHS!“, he is outraged. Before adding: “You may be rightly thinking, “Oh, so it’s 3 months paid, right?” We can’t stop someone from working for three months without pay. WRONG That’s exactly what they did, and unfortunately it’s completely legal”. “I said I can’t survive three months without paying, I have a mortgage and they looked me in the eyes and said, “Well, you probably shouldn’t have signed the contract like that.” Within a few minutes my email blocked and my time at Blizzard was over.“, he concludes. Curtain.