Employee Union Accuses Activision Blizzard of Labor Law Violations, Files Complaint With NLRB

The Communications Works of America has filed a complaint against Activision Blizzard, accusing the publisher of violating federal labor laws via threatening statements towards employees. The charge, which the union filed through the National Labor Relations Board in partnership with the A Better ABK employee coalition at Activision Blizzard, also accuses the publisher of surveilling employees as well as interrogating them through polling and other coercive tactics.

CWA states that the company’s management is “using coercive tactics to attempt to prevent its employees from exercising their rights,” specifically workers’ rights to organize. As noted in the official complaint, the right to organize is protected by federal labor laws. Below are the official charges taken from the filed complaint:

The employer has threatened employees that they cannot talk about or communicate about wages, hours and working conditions; told employees they cannot communicate with or discuss ongoing investigations of wages, hours and working conditions; maintained an overly broad social media policy; enforced the social media policy against employees who have engaged in protected concerted activity; threatened or disciplined employees on account of protected concerted activity; engaged in surveillance of employees engaged in protected concerted activity and engaged in interrogation of employees about protected concerted activity

The latest complaint is the second major charge against Activision Blizzard, a follow up to another lawsuit with the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing filed back in July. California’s lawsuit alleges that the company fostered a hostile and abusive work environment that resulted in the discrimination and sexual harassment of its employees, particularly women and people of color.

Since then, while Activision has attempted to “fix” the situation through numerous firings and resignations, the company has also allegedly taken some not-so-legal actions to better its position; Namely, shredding documents relating to the case and pressuring employees to not talk about the company’s culture of abuse. Worse yet, Activision had apparently hired notorious union-busting firm WilmerHale in order to “aid the company” in auditing its hiring practices, something employees at the publisher aren’t happy with.

In response, Activision Blizzard employees created the A Better ABK employee group in order to organize developers and exercise their rights through a set of demands as well as staging a walkout protest. Despite the Activision Blizzard employees not being unionized themselves, CWA national organizing director Tom Smith reiterated that the union will “always stand shoulder to shoulder with workers fighting harassment, assault, and discrimination,” and hopes that the charges against ABK management “will not go unanswered.”

[Source: Bloomberg]