Blizzard Q&A With Leadership about Return to Office, WoW Hotfixes - February 17, 2023

[FossilFree]

Your opinion , not fact. Also, very insulting. The fact that you assume those opf us back in the day commuted to work sat there with strangers is purely being naive. I know everyone I work with and we have great rapport. And you aren't more productive at home because you are far more erasily distracted by the outside world.

Your reaction tells me I hit the nail directly on the head.

[callipygoustp]

Been steadily wfh over the course of many jobs for the past 25ish years. Has something changed?

[TheRevenantHero]

Every so cvalled "chall;enge" listed in this thread were challenges we faced. This generation is not special there. If people think being required to commute to work is "disrespecting them", they have no clue what disrespect actually means because they have been told to believe that if they aren't being given every thing for simply trying they are being "disrespected". They have bastardized the term.

Guess what? I was able to enjoy life despite working 8 hard hours every day. I don't obsess about it. I actually believe in just working hard when "on the clock". This generation wants to be worshiped, be given a pat on the head and handed a participant ribbon just for trying. They don't want to work hard. They can't handle criticism. Anything less than having their butt kissed is considered "disrespect". They only want to be in an environment where they cannot fail because they can't handle that either. But you insult me by ignorantly claiming it is a "weird work obsession" I have. Wanting people to work hard is not an obsession. It's wanting people to stop acting like they should be handed everything for little to no effort.

No. This generation wants to not run themselves ragged for no reason. Profits skyrocketed for companies that were doing work from home during the pandemic, proving that there is literally no need to go into the office. Productivity increased dramatically. Turnover rates dropped. Companies made far more money in profits. If people weren't working hard from home and were just "doing whatever they want", then why didn't companies just shut down due to lack of labor? How could companies have made record profits while working from home if nobody was doing the work?

Again, your statements are exceptionally ignorant.

[rrayy]

Your reaction tells me I hit the nail directly on the head.

NO you did't because you know nothign about me. And it was insulting to boot.

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No. This generation wants to not run themselves ragged for no reason. Profits skyrocketed for companies that were doing work from home during the pandemic, proving that there is literally no need to go into the office. Productivity increased dramatically. Turnover rates dropped. Companies made far more money in profits. If people weren't working hard from home and were just "doing whatever they want", then why didn't companies just shut down due to lack of labor? How could companies have made record profits while working from home if nobody was doing the work?

Again, your statements are exceptionally ignorant.

Working 8 hours a day is "being run ragged"? Having to commute to work is "being run ragged"? Looks like I hit the nail on the head with this generation being soft and lazy.

The rest is BS with yoru sources being "Dude: trust me". Profits did not skyrocket during the pandemic. Unless you think Blizzard falling behind schedule, having projects delayed is making money which you really don't know business then. Just nosense made up to justify being too lazy to commute to the office.

[craigw]

my best friend works from home and plays warcraft all day long while "working". my guild leader and 3 other guildies do the same. damn straight they dont want to return to the office.

[TheRevenantHero]

NO you did't because you know nothign about me. And it was insulting to boot.

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Working 8 hours a day is "being run ragged"? Having to commute to work is "being run ragged"? Looks like I hit the nail on the head with this generation being soft and lazy.

The rest is BS with yoru sources being "Dude: trust me". Profits did not skyrocket during the pandemic. Unless you think Blizzard falling behind schedule, having projects delayed is making money which you really don't know business then. Just nosense made up to justify being too lazy to commute to the office.

LMFAO it's considered being run ragged because most companies refuse to pay proper wages for the work they expect. You didn't hit shit.

https://www.oxfam.org/en/press-relea...rest-pay-price

https://ilostat.ilo.org/why-would-la...ng-a-pandemic/

There's your proof. Blizzard was failing because the rampant sexual harassment was laid bare. It had absolutley nothing to do with the pandemic. So once more, working from home did the OPPOSITE of promoting laziness. Just take the L and admit you're wrong.

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my best friend works from home and plays warcraft all day long while "working". my guild leader and 3 other guildies do the same. damn straight they dont want to return to the office.

Then the company your friend works for doesn't care what they do as long as shit gets done.

[craigw]

LMFAO it's considered being run ragged because most companies refuse to pay proper wages for the work they expect. You didn't hit shit.

https://www.oxfam.org/en/press-relea...rest-pay-price

https://ilostat.ilo.org/why-would-la...ng-a-pandemic/

There's your proof. Blizzard was failing because the rampant sexual harassment was laid bare. It had absolutley nothing to do with the pandemic. So once more, working from home did the OPPOSITE of promoting laziness. Just take the L and admit you're wrong.

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Then the company your friend works for doesn't care what they do as long as shit gets done.

so you know the company and him real well dont ya?

[NineSpine]

That's a quite different topic though. I don't know how the situation is in the US, but in other countries you do get quite a lot of support from your company (and country, such as maternity leave for both parents etc.) when it comes to that and of course individual agreements are still ALWAYS possible.

And seriously, I do absolutely understand your issue and of course many people struggle with this too... and I really don't like saying this, but your private issues and expenses aren't always also an issue for your employer and people in every job outside of IT have to completely suck it up without any possibilities. We're talking here from a very privileged position already.

The United States has no state support for child care and employers almost never support it. You can basically expect to spend at least a third of your income for one median wage job on childcare for one kid.

[TheRevenantHero]

so you know the company and him real well dont ya?

The only companies that let that sort of thing go are companies that only care about whether or not you get shit done instead of expecting slaving busywork.

[NineSpine]

Your opinion , not fact. Also, very insulting. The fact that you assume those opf us back in the day commuted to work sat there with strangers is purely being naive. I know everyone I work with and we have great rapport. And you aren't more productive at home because you are far more erasily distracted by the outside world.

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The challenges are the same. The challenges my parents faced are the same ones I now face. They are the same ones my kids are now facing as they are now in the work force. Do we whine, cry and demand everything be handed to us? No. We all work hard and we feel fulfilled that we got through another day of hard work. This generation complains because they have to get off their ass and drive to work The horror!

That's a bunch of horseshit.

My parents had it insanely easy. College, homes, and healthcare were all dirt cheap. Jobs (for white men) were plentiful and paid enough for a family right out of high school. Most jobs were unionized.

I had it basically just as easy as they did.

The generations younger than me are totally being fucked over by people like you. You and I had everything handed to us, all the bridges built for us, and then when we got to the other side a bunch of you turned around and lit it all on fire out of spite, just so you could self-righteously claim the bridges never existed. You are the Me Me Me Generation, a bunch of narcissists who were born on third base and thought you hit a triple.

[Jester Joe]

Every so called "challenge" listed in this thread were challenges we faced. This generation is not special there.

Stop being disingenuous. Ignoring what people say isn't making your argument.

COVID happened. The rapid advancement of technology happened. No one had to deal with either of those in the last generation. If you take 5 seconds to actually look at the situation, anyone can see that. Pretending it doesn't exist and acting like COVID is similar to the Flu, like you did before, is straight up misrepresenting reality.

Guess what? I was able to enjoy life despite working 8 hard hours every day. I don't obsess about it. I actually believe in just working hard when "on the clock". This generation wants to be worshiped, be given a pat on the head and handed a participant ribbon just for trying. They don't want to work hard. They can't handle criticism. Anything less than having their butt kissed is considered "disrespect". They only want to be in an environment where they cannot fail because they can't handle that either. But you insult me by ignorantly claiming it is a "weird work obsession" I have. Wanting people to work hard is not an obsession. It's wanting people to stop acting like they should be handed everything for little to no effort.

You have from your first post done nothing but trash talk everyone as "lazy" and "Whiny". But god forbid someone tells you that your workaholic fixation isn't exactly healthy or for everyone, then you're the one suddenly to start complaining about being insulted? Nah, that isn't how it works. You're just being the poster boy for boomer talking points that have no place in reality but because you've seen a pretty convincing article about how millennials are ruining the world, it must be true!

Again, you've given nothing to support your argument though besides claims of laziness on others and saying basically shouting off a mountain about yourself.

Meanwhile, if you take a moment to click any links people have provided to you, you can easily see that in this case, Blizzard is well documented for underpaying people and mistreating their workers. So yes, when that company starts demanding people come back to the office, they're going to be called out and their staff has every right to complain, especially considering what vile acts happened last time everyone was in the Blizzard offices.

[Tiwack]

Pretty damning how low regard customer support (CS) and quality assurance (QA) are being held at, wouldn't want to respect customers and cut into profits now would we?

How the mighty have fallen, squeezing the lemon to improve revenue year over year like every other company with a messed up corporate culture trashing their own IP and products with no respect for employees or customers, only shareholders and quarterly reports.

[NineSpine]

You have from your first post done nothing but trash talk everyone as "lazy" and "Whiny". But god forbid someone tells you that your workaholic fixation isn't exactly healthy or for everyone, then you're the one suddenly to start complaining about being insulted? Nah, that isn't how it works. You're just being the poster boy for boomer talking points that have no place in reality but because you've seen a pretty convincing article about how millennials are ruining the world, it must be true!

Again, you've given nothing to support your argument though besides claims of laziness on others and saying basically shouting off a mountain about yourself.

Meanwhile, if you take a moment to click any links people have provided to you, you can easily see that in this case, Blizzard is well documented for underpaying people and mistreating their workers. So yes, when that company starts demanding people come back to the office, they're going to be called out and their staff has every right to complain, especially considering what vile acts happened last time everyone was in the Blizzard offices.

I've been working with people like him for decades. They are the whiniest, most entitled people on the planet. They just project that onto everyone else. They're the type of people that work in middle management and want people back in the office because WFH exposes how little they actually get done.

[Linkedblade]

Americans rarely understand working standards and employee rights.

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Just couldn't wait to get mad at PoC and trans people eh? Just bubbling over like some cauldron of hate. Discourse in America is so fucked

I never said anything about PoC or trans people. I'm talking about these good-for-nothing equity college majors that literally serve no function other than to ruin everything.

[Zyky]

Ybarra is not he who shall not be named.

Not everyone at a higher position gets paid more hourly. I make more hourly than my boss and I am full time. Only reason he gets more is he is salery, but he also works up to 15 hrs a week more than me.

Ybarra is a sellout shill, we saw that when there were 2 co-leaders and he got paid more because he was a male compared to his counterpart who got paid less because she was a female for the EXACT SAME ROLE. He can say "I wanted equal pay" but he certainly didn't fight for equal pay.

[yeahibeatmymeat]

Fuck man, I remember when Blizzard used to be PRAISED. You'd hear "World of Warcraft" or "Blizzard" and people's eyes would light up.

Such a pathetic fucking excuse now, so sad.

We are finally in the endgame. I give the WoW studio 5 more years tops. Especially if the Microsoft acquisition flops. Finding a reason to subscribe is already hard enough as is with all the lack of polish and questionable game designs.
Adding maltreated employees to the mix just makes it that much harder. Back to consoles for me.

[RobertMugabe]

The United States has no state support for child care and employers almost never support it. You can basically expect to spend at least a third of your income for one median wage job on childcare for one kid.

I am sorry to hear that, didn't know that

[Xilurm]

Just go back to work like the rest of us have and stop being whiny snowflakes

He didn't do anything of the sort. They had everyoen work from home becuase of the pandemic. The pandemic is over. How dare he ask those who were working in the office come back. Society has become increasingly weak and entitled. It's pathetic.

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Nobody is anti-worker. It amazes me how people support the worker being able to whatever the hell they want while being paid by their employer. The employer has every right to set ground rules.The worker does not have to stay there if they don't like the ground rules.

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Every single one was working in the office prior to the pandemic. These arguments don't fly. It is not unreasonable to ahve workers in the office full time because that is the way it was before the pandemic.

What is unreasonable is workers thinking they should be able to do whatever the hell they want while getting paid for it. If the company is paying you to work for them, they have the right to set the ground rules. IF you don't like the ground rules, you can find an employer who has ground rules that you can work with in.

Man you guys (and a lot others here) really love the idea of slaving away for 8 hours a day, 5 days out of 7 a week, for 40 years straight in your life huh? And when you're finally done and you have no strength left you're just waiting to die. What a dream huh? The perfect life.

And no, I don't give a shit that "this is the norm". The only way to change the norm is to fight against it. It's been 150 years too long. The rise of the industrial era made humans brainwashed and now we're at a point where people love the fact that they can't even live their lives, and that they only get a few hours a day to actually live, even if it's a few hours of them being tired as fuck.

Can't wait for AI to finally start taking jobs so people can be free. UBI can't come too soon.

[Dontrike]

"Executives aren't making as much as you think" has to be one of the funniest random things I think I've heard someone say.

[MoanaLisa]

You never would have survived when I grew up. There was no such thing as WFH. ANd a lot of people who do WFH aren't doing there job. How dare companies makes sure people sre doing what they are paid to do. Ho dare they want to trying to revive their offices.

There are job categories, IT being one of them, where people are reviewed on their performance against goals. Goals usually break down into individual projects and the employee is expected to hit the due date on those projects or have a good explanation why they didn't. To that extent, job performance isn't related to set hours or anything like it. As for management being able to know what their employees are doing, there are plenty of ways of doing that and many of them are used (sometimes to excess).

Not really trying to start an argument here but whether a job position is doable from a remote location is highly dependent on what it is. Collaboration is not difficult via online collaboration tools, but it is different. Much like online education, any attempt to replicate the in-office (or in-classroom) experience in a remote (WFH) environment is bound to fail. It's quite true that there were entire categories of jobs and social functions that never learned this. There are, of course, many kinds of jobs (manufacturing and associated QA) where physical objects are being built/created and of course that will require attendance. In this case though, those sorts of jobs have been "attended" all along, many during so-called lockdowns.

Simply put: WFH/Remote work is very feasible and can lead to better results with happier employees/team members. But it's very different and the old "back in my day" rules don't really apply. It's a management failure when that isn't recognized.