Activision Blizzard Worker Group Votes to Unionize in NLRB Election
The first worker group within video game giant Activision Blizzard to formally attempt to unionize has prevailed in a National Labor Relations Board election.
Nineteen Quality Assurance (QA) testers at the Wisconsin-based Activision Blizzard subsidiary Raven Software voted in favor of the union in a Monday vote, while three members voted against the union. The desired bargaining unit, backed by the Communications Workers of America (CWA), is composed of about 21 QA testers based at Raven’s Middleton, Wisconsin studio. (Two ballots were challenged during the ballot counting process.) The Hollywood Reporter observed the ballot count via a Zoom feed as it was tallied at an NLRB subregional office in Milwaukee.
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The Raven Software worker group, called the Game Workers Alliance, said in a collective statement on Monday that “Now that we’ve won our election, it is our duty to protect these foundational values on which our union stands.” The group added, “Our biggest hope is that our union serves as inspiration for the growing movement of workers organizing at video game studios to create better games and build workplaces that reflect our values and empower all of us. We look forward to working with management to positively shape our working conditions and the future of Activision Blizzard through a strong union contract.”
An Activision Blizzard spokesperson said of Monday’s vote, “We respect and believe in the right of all employees to decide whether or not to support or vote for a union. We believe that an important decision that will impact the entire Raven Software studio of roughly 350 people should not be made by 19 Raven employees.”
At this stage, the employer or the union could still file an objection by May 31, but if no such protests are made, the union will be certified on May 31.
The Raven Software NLRB vote represented a key test of whether the incipient unionization movement in video games could break into a AAA video game studio. Prior to the Raven vote, a union was successfully certified at indie video game studio Vodeo Games (maker of Beast Breaker), while tabletop role-playing game maker Paizo also voluntarily recognized a worker union. Still, the gaming industry overall remains overwhelmingly non-union. The CWA launched its Campaign to Organize Digital Employees (CODE) initiative in 2020 in part to make headway in the industry, and represented both the Vodeo Games and Paizo worker groups. IATSE is also attempting to organize the industry with its Rights & Protections for Gameworkers (RPG) campaign.
Prior to the NLRB vote, Activision Blizzard threw up a few potential roadblocks to an election, initially calling for the proposed bargaining unit to include over 90 additional job titles (a move that could have diluted support for the union). Activision Blizzard also sought to have the election dismissed because it noted that the “nature of the Employer’s operations have fundamentally changed at the facility in question.” (A few days after Raven Software workers went public with their unionization effort, the company announced that it was converting all U.S.-based temporary and contingent workers to full-time employees.) On April 22, an NLRB regional director allowed an election to proceed after ruling that the CWA’s bargaining unit was appropriate and that the recent changes to Activision Blizzard QA workers did not disqualify the election.
Now, the Raven Software group will embark on negotiating their first contract at the studio at a time of organizational flux at its parent company. In January, Microsoft announced that it was acquiring Activision Blizzard for $68.7 billion, a deal that, if closed, would make Microsoft the third largest video game company in the world.
In March, Raven Software QA tester Onah Rongstad told THR that although there was a lot of “uncertainty” about the deal, “the unionization effort is going to be the same regardless of which company is in charge at the end of the day.”
Also on Monday, the NLRB announced that an L.A.-based regional director had found merit to a 2021 unfair labor practices charge filed by the CWA against Activision Blizzard, finding the employer enforced an “overbroad” social media policy and that Blizzard Entertainment had “violated the [National Labor Relations] Act by threatening employees in the exercise of Section 7 rights; enforcing its social media policy; and threatening or disciplining employees on account of their protected concerted activities.” While most unfair labor practices that are found to have merit settle, if a settlement is not reached, the NLRB region will likely produce a complaint.
In a statement, an Activision Blizzard spokesperson called the allegations “false” and added, “Employees may and do talk freely about these workplace issues without retaliation, and our social media policy expressly incorporates employees’ NLRA rights.” The social media policy says it “does not restrict employees from engaging in the communication of information protected by law, including for example, rights of employees in the United States protected by the National Labor Relations Act,” the spokesperson added.
