A Letter From CEO Bobby Kotick Regarding Progress and Commitments Made at Acti-Blizz

[Jester Joe]

Again equally qualified doesn't mean what you are saying.

Alright I'm looking for someone to come in and design a pool area. Jim has a sketch pad and a can do spirit it would be his first job, Jane has the latest pool area rendering software an excellent grasp of creative cloud and a masters in architecture and excellent references from the 50 other outdoor rest spaces she has designed in the last two years. Are they equally qualified or is Jane a far superior option. Note I said design a pool area not build one. You can design an area with just a sketchpad after all.

You're listing off their skills and experience and trying to mix that into qualifications.

Someone can be qualified for a position, but less skilled than another. There's a reason why qualifications and skills preferred are usually separated on job listings.

[Straga21]

There are elements of what you say with which I agree, and others with which I disagree.

Absolutely, no one should ever be hired on the basis of race/sex etc. But I think that this notion is largely a misconception that is spread by those opposed to moves aimed at achieving better gender parity in the workplace.

The fact is that in the IT industry, women are just generally screwed over. This starts in early childhood where societal norms teach children that IT is part of the male domain. This continues into early adulthood where peer-pressure discourages young women from even considering a career in IT. And again, this is reinforced in the actual workplace, as was evident at Blizzard, the environment is somewhat hostile towards females. It also doesn't help that this pervasive societal norm biases companies to assume that men are simply going to be better at the job than female counterparts. Other excuses I have heard over the years:

• female employees create a distraction for male employees
• female employees will get pregnant and this will cost the company
• female employees don't have the same kind of necessary logical thinking that males have

All of the above are pretty obviously just gender stereotypes and/or the result of a set of gender roles that society deems important. Obvious counters to the above include:

• if men are distracted by female employees that is a problem with the men. Don't disadvantage females for this
• work on changing gender roles in our society to make men equally involved in the task of raising children
• stop regarding females as intellectually inferior when all the actual evidence proves otherwise

Whether most of us want to admit it or not, the fact is that the entire IT ecosystem is set up currently to disadvantage women. And if we're ever going to fix that we need to take proactive steps to counter that. While the idea that organisations should hire purely on merit seems wonderful, but it is massively flawed because what constitutes "merit" is pretty damned subjective. I firmly believe that if companies who do hire on "merit" were more objective then we wouldn't have a situation where there is such a strong bias towards hiring men.

Consider this: If you start with the realisation that females are just as capable as males in IT industry, but the rate of hiring between males and females is disproportionate, then clearly there is a bias in there. So if you make a commitment to hire on a proportional basis (ie quotas) and then select the best X number of females and the best Y number of males, then you can effectively remove the bias even if you don't necessarily understand it. Over time, as your workplace becomes more inclusive, it will become easier to assess males and females against each other more effectively and without bias, at which point you can remove quotas and move to a pure "merit" basis where "merit" is assessed more fairly.

Did you ever think that maybe, just maybe there are actual differences between men and women? There are exceptions but in all fields you have a tendency of either males or females, You say the IT industry is somehow all against women, yet all we have are extra options for every women, be it less points they need or monetary help to get into the IT industry, and as someone who just this year started university in programming, you know what I see? The truth. 95% of us are male, even with all the extras, most females are not interested in IT or programming.
Now if you have a 10000 male candidates and 10 female candidates and a 100 positions, and you decide to hire 90 men and all 10 females, just because they are female, then you have discriminated against those males, and that's it. No ifs, no buts. We were taught as children that discrimination is bad, yet all we see since 2010+ is that white people need to be hired less cause they are white, and males need to be hired less in office jobs cause they are males. They are very welcome to work at physical jobs that kill their back around age 50 though. Good luck guys.

[The Stormbringer]

Yeah this is the deathblow. Any hope for salvage is gone.

https://www.linkedin.com/business/ta...by-166-percent

https://www.pcgamer.com/how-blizzard...n-just-3-years

Many more articles like this. It's amazing how this push and decline timeline lines up so perfectly. Clearly coincidence.

Ah yeah, I'm sure those female interns were the ones that tanked the company. Sure thing, buddy. Please, continue to show your bigotry to everyone.

- - - Updated - - -

as the father of a two-year-old daughter, I must disagree. we do not present any predispositions to our daughter, we do not dictate to her what is and what is not right, we always let her choose the path according to herself. at the moment she is not in contact with other children (for example in kindergarten), so she has no other influence than from us, her parents. and already now, in the morning rain, you can see how she tends on her own in girls' activities, colors, shapes, etc. so no, no dictated role, predisposition, historical bullshit ... nothing. it's just in her, just like in any person on this planet. by nature.

This is bullshit, unless you're saying your daughter A.) has no access to any forms of media, B.) doesn't spend time around any other children, C.) picks out all of her own toys and clothes, and D.) doesn't observe actions from her own family. You act like it's nature when in reality it's nurture. Or have you actually been offering her both "boy" and "girl" toys, clothes, etcetera and letting her choose?

And just to be clear, I'm not attacking you or claiming you're a bad parent in any way, I don't think there's anything wrong with what you've described, but it's not magically neutral and perfectly unbiased like you're saying it is.

EDIT: Forget B, I misread what you said on that one and her not having contact with other kids, my bad.

[LaserChild9]

A diverse workplace is better than a non diverse one. It’s not like there aren’t talented female/NB developers out there

Is it though? I mean, if you needed dangerous surgery to save your life, would you prefer to be operated on by a surgeon who got their position by showing proven experience and expertise in their field or a surgeon who got the job over the experienced experts because of their age/gender/skin colour/sexuality/etc ticked a box on a diversity form?

Employers should always hire the best person for the job, the person that has worked hardest and gained the most experience or proven in some way that they are the best choice for the job. As other people have already pointed out a company can't have a diverse workforce if the industry as a whole does not have a diverse workforce.

In my opinion, I think that diversity should be monitored for abuse, so HR departments should have audits of applications for a role to check the successful applicants were chosen because they were the best and not because of the interviewer's personal bias. At the moment it feels like diversity is simply looked at for the raw numbers and nothing more, x company has 75% male staff so they need to hire more women, rather than looking at why the company has more male staff. Did many women apply for the position? Of those that did, were any the best candidate for the position? Does the industry generally just have that many more male workers?

A workplace where everyone was hired for their skills is better than a workplace where everyone was hired based on a diversity quota.

[Raelbo]

but men and women are naturally predisposed to different actions. that is just a fact.

That may be relevant in a primitive agrarian society without technology. But it's utterly irrelevant in modern society. The gender norms we persist with today are simply a relic from a bygone era that are in desperate need of reform. To be fair, much has changed for the better over the last 200 years, but the error is in assuming that we have arrived where we should be.

and that is fine. also it is fine if women want to (and is capable of doing it fine) do a "manly predisposed" activity (and vice versa). again, is is their free will and choice.

Please explain what makes women naturally predisposed to (low paying) careers like nursing, teaching and childcare, while men are naturally predisposed to high powered positions like running large corporations and being president?

Yes it is a rhetorical question. If you can't see the obvious at this point, that is a you-problem.

to think that an activity is a man's affair does not matter until we prevent women from performing these activities, which of course we do not.

Of course we do. You just don't understand the power of peer pressure and how societal norms direct our actions and choices.

the problem just arises when we start accepting women at the expense of men (and vice versa) just because they have a different gender / race. this is a real and pure bias. you do your job at work, you don't create a social bubble and an artificial environment.

But you're 100% fine with the fact that modern society continues to advantage men over women in a very significant way? Why, because you just handwave it away with this puerile narrative you're trying to spin?

how far will we push this nonsense? will we claim in a moment that men should also give births to the children? because why should it be explicitly the role of women ... right... pls cut the crap, really

So you want to compare jobs in IT, which have absolutely nothing to do with the reproductive organs we're born with, to our roles in human reproduction, which of course have everything to do with our reproductive organs. /facepalm

as the father of a two-year-old daughter, I must disagree. we do not present any predispositions to our daughter, we do not dictate to her what is and what is not right, we always let her choose the path according to herself. at the moment she is not in contact with other children (for example in kindergarten), so she has no other influence than from us, her parents. and already now, in the morning rain, you can see how she tends on her own in girls' activities, colors, shapes, etc. so no, no dictated role, predisposition, historical bullshit ... nothing. it's just in her, just like in any person on this planet. by nature.

Nice piece of fiction. Hell, I can even accept that you believe it, but that doesn't make it true.

you are speaking about gender, all the time. i am not, all the time. gender is some abstract bullshit defined by humans. i do not care about that at all. i do not care if men want to be a woman (and vice versa). i do not care if they have penis or vagina between their legs.

Clearly you are not paying attention to what I am saying. I am talking about gender roles. Did you even bother to check out the link I sent you? Of course not. Heaven forbid you actually try to expose yourself to actual expert opinion.

all I care about is how they are. and when I hire a person for work, I am also interested in what he is like and whether he/she is suitable for the position. if I get 10 transsexuals in a row for an interview and they will be the right ones for the position, there will be 10 transsexuals running in the company. if there are 10 white men in a row, and they will be the right ones for the same position, there will be 10 white men running around the company. but I will certainly not forcefully push and select candidates just to meet some nonsensical abstract norm. that is all

Dude, you're probably not even aware of your biases, even though you've made it quite evident in our little discussion here that you have them very strongly. Do you even care about your daughter or the world you're helping to prop up that wishes to relegate her to second rate citizen status?

[Hellobolis]

But you're 100% fine with the fact that modern society continues to advantage men over women in a very significant way? Why, because you just handwave it away with this puerile narrative you're trying to spin?

That's actually a thing for the average person? I can totally see it in higher up management positions and the like, but for a normal person with a normal job?

[Usodabada]

female employees create a distraction for male employees

They can, sex and attraction are biogical features that exist in males and females.

female employees will get pregnant and this will cost the company

Yes, that's the truth.

female employees don't have the same kind of necessary logical thinking that males have

We are different, yes. I'm not saying anyone is worth or better but certainly very different.

work on changing gender roles in our society to make men equally involved in the task of raising children

And yet women are still regarded as better caretaker, doesn't even seem wrong.

stop regarding females as intellectually inferior when all the actual evidence proves otherwise

What's a Bell Curve for 100 please.

[Raelbo]

Did you ever think that maybe, just maybe there are actual differences between men and women?

Yes (as in capability differences when it comes to modern careers). When I was young, stupid and arrogant and still believed that I was entirely the architect of own my success without any kind of benefit of the fact that I was lucky enough to be born white, male and in an upper-middle class family. Don't get me wrong, I still worked hard to earn my place in the world, but I am humble enough to acknowledge that without the opportunities I was given, opportunities that are denied to most people, I would almost certainly be just another statistic.

There are exceptions but in all fields you have a tendency of either males or females

Yes, and I am saying that this is largely the result of gender roles, which is a societal construct, rather than due to some "natural order".

You say the IT industry is somehow all against women, yet all we have are extra options for every women, be it less points they need or monetary help to get into the IT industry, and as someone who just this year started university in programming, you know what I see? The truth. 95% of us are male, even with all the extras, most females are not interested in IT or programming.

And why exactly do you think that is? The explanation has been given by experts who study this sort of thing: gender roles in society. It's that simple. IT is a male domain. It always has been, so society's natural tendency is to try and keep it that way by telling girls, from the day they are born, that it is not for them.

Now if you have a 10000 male candidates and 10 female candidates and a 100 positions, and you decide to hire 90 men and all 10 females, just because they are female, then you have discriminated against those males, and that's it. No ifs, no buts. We were taught as children that discrimination is bad, yet all we see since 2010+ is that white people need to be hired less cause they are white, and males need to be hired less in office jobs cause they are males. They are very welcome to work at physical jobs that kill their back around age 50 though. Good luck guys.

Your hypothetical numbers are horribly skewed.

If you have 100 applicants for a job, and 60 are male, 40 are female, and you hire 80 males, you're likely biased in your recruitment process. Making a conscious effort to hire more females will help to reduce your bias.

And let me be clear here. In my 25 year career I have never experienced female professionals to be less competent than males. If anything the opposite is true, which is hardly surprising given that men have historically been given unfair preference when it comes to recruitment.

[Usodabada]

Please explain what makes women naturally predisposed to (low paying) careers like nursing, teaching and childcare, while men are naturally predisposed to high powered positions like running large corporations and being president?

Many highly paid jobs are dangerous, far away or don't play into female strength at all. Females on average seem to prefer social Jobs, surprise surprise.

[Utrrabbit]

Dude, you misunderstood my intentions. I'm making fun of white progressives who think they need to save all the minorities because said minorities don't have the capacity to save themselves.

- - - Updated - - -



If course. You can't define it (see Ibram X. Kendi, "racism is things that are racist") you can't even spell it. But if someone disagrees with you, they're a racist.

Difference between not agreeing with someone, and you blatently stating something that is racist.

I appreciate you pointing out a typo while I am on my phone, but than start your reply with wordinf thar literally makes no sense.

[Kumorii]

same reason there is a law about minimum wage.

Same reason? Minimum wage is to prevent slave wages... What CEO salary is considered slave wages? Do CEO risk being paid to little even? What even is to little for a CEO?

[Ihavewaffles]

A Letter From CEO Bobby Kotick Regarding Progress and Commitments Made at Activision Blizzard

CEO Bobby Kotick Outlines Progress and Commitments

Today, CEO Bobby Kotick shared the following email with our employees:

Everyone,

A few weeks ago, I reiterated our commitment to become the most welcoming, inclusive company in our industry. Today, I want to update you on some initial progress and important, additional steps we are taking to advance our commitment with greater impact, transparency, and urgency.

First, I want to offer my sincere gratitude for your continued focus and dedication to our players –

With thanks and deepest gratitude,

Bobby

Dedication tp shareholders, what else is this new storemount!?

[Raelbo]

Is it though? I mean, if you needed dangerous surgery to save your life, would you prefer to be operated on by a surgeon who got their position by showing proven experience and expertise in their field or a surgeon who got the job over the experienced experts because of their age/gender/skin colour/sexuality/etc ticked a box on a diversity form?

I would rather that when medical schools take in new students they don't arbitrarily exclude a significant portion of the population, and thus some of those with the best potential, simply because society gave an unfair advantage to other groups. This way, by the time these people advance to the position of senior surgeon, they will be the best of everyone instead of the best of half of everyone.

Employers should always hire the best person for the job, the person that has worked hardest and gained the most experience or proven in some way that they are the best choice for the job.

True. But figuring out who that is tends to be somewhat subjective. And if you're talking about junior positions and giving opportunities to people to gain that experience, it's generally more guesswork and luck than anything else. Making sure you have a good spread across diversity lines which are representative of the available talent pool is as good as any selection process if we're being honest, probably better than most even.

As other people have already pointed out a company can't have a diverse workforce if the industry as a whole does not have a diverse workforce.

This is absolutely true. However it does point to a problem within the industry that should be addressed. Also, as those who like to keep pointing this out tend to ignore, Blizzard isn't aiming to achieve a diversity in their workforce that is out of line with what is available in the industry. They're aiming to reach 35% female staff within 5 years. Secondly, they're actively committing to help to improve the number of females in the industry through their training programs.

In my opinion, I think that diversity should be monitored for abuse, so HR departments should have audits of applications for a role to check the successful applicants were chosen because they were the best and not because of the interviewer's personal bias.

Given the facts that we know, eg 77% of Blizzard employees are male; their recently exposed "fratboy culture", it is not unreasonable to consider the distinct possibility that, as an organisation, they had a strong bias towards hiring males.

At the moment it feels like diversity is simply looked at for the raw numbers and nothing more, x company has 75% male staff so they need to hire more women, rather than looking at why the company has more male staff. Did many women apply for the position? Of those that did, were any the best candidate for the position? Does the industry generally just have that many more male workers?

I don't think that Blizzard would be pursuing this latest path if the answers to those questions didn't point to problems.

For example: If they had 77% male staff due to a lack of female applicants, they need to understand why female applicants are avoiding applying to Blizzard (I refer to the "fratboy culture" already mentioned). By fixing their reputation as being a work environment hostile to female employees, Blizzard would end up getting more females to apply. Also, by actively marketing to females in the industry, Blizzard could also attract more applicants. With more female applicants it is only natural that more of the "best" candidates would be female.

Example 2: If the industry lacks female talent, take proactive steps to address this.

A workplace where everyone was hired for their skills is better than a workplace where everyone was hired based on a diversity quota.

The two are not mutually exclusive. You're actually far more likely to acquire the best skills if you're hiring from the entire talent pool. I completely agree that diversity quotas shouldn't dictate who gets hired. They should push companies to pursue talent across the spectrum of race, gender etc.

If we're being honest, the notion that 77% of the world's talent for making great games resides in males is BS. The fact that 77% of their workforce is male points to the fact that they've been remiss in tapping into the female talent that is out there.

[Ajko]

That may be relevant in a primitive agrarian society without technology. But it's utterly irrelevant in modern society. The gender norms we persist with today are simply a relic from a bygone era that are in desperate need of reform. To be fair, much has changed for the better over the last 200 years, but the error is in assuming that we have arrived where we should be.



Please explain what makes women naturally predisposed to (low paying) careers like nursing, teaching and childcare, while men are naturally predisposed to high powered positions like running large corporations and being president?

Yes it is a rhetorical question. If you can't see the obvious at this point, that is a you-problem.



Of course we do. You just don't understand the power of peer pressure and how societal norms direct our actions and choices.



But you're 100% fine with the fact that modern society continues to advantage men over women in a very significant way? Why, because you just handwave it away with this puerile narrative you're trying to spin?



So you want to compare jobs in IT, which have absolutely nothing to do with the reproductive organs we're born with, to our roles in human reproduction, which of course have everything to do with our reproductive organs. /facepalm



Nice piece of fiction. Hell, I can even accept that you believe it, but that doesn't make it true.




Clearly you are not paying attention to what I am saying. I am talking about gender roles. Did you even bother to check out the link I sent you? Of course not. Heaven forbid you actually try to expose yourself to actual expert opinion.



Dude, you're probably not even aware of your biases, even though you've made it quite evident in our little discussion here that you have them very strongly. Do you even care about your daughter or the world you're helping to prop up that wishes to relegate her to second rate citizen status?

your text suggests that you will probably be a woman (a slight hatred of men is felt). I don't know who, how, why and when he hurt you, but this abstract fight against a non-existent problem leads nowhere. you're wasting time. if you want to see the inequality between men and women, you will always find them. even in a perfectly balanced world. start with yourself, then deal with others and society. I don't blame you for feeling like a snowflake and a fighter for the law and a protector of those who are hurt. after all, we live in the world we make.

[cuafpr]

What I found odd was that there apparently is a law how low a CEO can go with his salary.
I mean going down to lowest possible is unexpected and actually I commend him for it. But why is there a law about that? O.o

It's a minimum amount to be considered a salaried employee vs paid by the hour, I think most states have it. It prevents a company from saying you are salaried at 15k/year which means no overtime pay cause you are salary. You want to make an employee's salary you have to pay them more.


and I'll catch flak for this but I respect him doing the paycut till his company hits those goals laid out

[Edgysan]

>$250 million over the next 10 years in initiatives that foster expanded opportunities in gaming and technology for under-represented communities

so they hire by race and sex/gender instead who is the best fit for the job... no wonder all their games are dogshit now

[Straga21]

Yes (as in capability differences when it comes to modern careers). When I was young, stupid and arrogant and still believed that I was entirely the architect of own my success without any kind of benefit of the fact that I was lucky enough to be born white, male and in an upper-middle class family. Don't get me wrong, I still worked hard to earn my place in the world, but I am humble enough to acknowledge that without the opportunities I was given, opportunities that are denied to most people, I would almost certainly be just another statistic.



Yes, and I am saying that this is largely the result of gender roles, which is a societal construct, rather than due to some "natural order".



And why exactly do you think that is? The explanation has been given by experts who study this sort of thing: gender roles in society. It's that simple. IT is a male domain. It always has been, so society's natural tendency is to try and keep it that way by telling girls, from the day they are born, that it is not for them.



Your hypothetical numbers are horribly skewed.

If you have 100 applicants for a job, and 60 are male, 40 are female, and you hire 80 males, you're likely biased in your recruitment process. Making a conscious effort to hire more females will help to reduce your bias.

And let me be clear here. In my 25 year career I have never experienced female professionals to be less competent than males. If anything the opposite is true, which is hardly surprising given that men have historically been given unfair preference when it comes to recruitment.

My numbers were never meant to be accurate, they were meant to show you how weak your argument is which you completely sidestepped, and that there's discrimination being pushed today only it's been renamed "inclusion" and stupid people buy it.
"Gender roles" you know there's plenty of stories of people who were treated as a male by their fathers because they wanted a son and in the end they just wanted to be girly. There will be exceptions, but girls tend to end up liking girly stuff in average. You can fight tooth and nail against it, it still happens. Men and women are different, they like different things.
I have never seen a person in IT attacking any girls that they somehow do not belong, yet there's few of them BECAUSE it's not something that girls on average are interested in. You can deny it all you want, it's still true.
"I was lucky enough to be born white, male and in an upper-middle class family." You were lucky enough to be in an upper-middle class family, that is it. You gain no bonuses from being a male, especially not being a white male as evidenced by what Blizzard and idiotic leftists are doing nowadays.

[Ajko]

This is bullshit, unless you're saying your daughter A.) has no access to any forms of media, B.) doesn't spend time around any other children, C.) picks out all of her own toys and clothes, and D.) doesn't observe actions from her own family. You act like it's nature when in reality it's nurture. Or have you actually been offering her both "boy" and "girl" toys, clothes, etcetera and letting her choose?

And just to be clear, I'm not attacking you or claiming you're a bad parent in any way, I don't think there's anything wrong with what you've described, but it's not magically neutral and perfectly unbiased like you're saying it is.

EDIT: Forget B, I misread what you said on that one and her not having contact with other kids, my bad.

me, my wife and our daughter live in a foreign country. it can be said that we have been pretty much isolated since her birth. we don't have cable TV, we don't watch media. my wife's sister has a son one year older than our daughter. she sent us clothes and toys in packages after him. in addition, we bought both neutral and girls' clothing. we let our daughter pick clothes from the closet and watch what she likes. what colors, what type of clothes. when it comes to toys, most are neutral. she does not explicitly have dolls or toy cars. the only contact with the family is (unfortunately so far) exclusively through messenger calls, and as it may affect the daughter, it's hard to say, but it probably won't be much.

my wife and I aren't trying to be some form of alternative parent, we just agreed to let our daughter express herself the way she wants to (I hope it lasts).

[Aggressive]

read the rest, before they gave warnings, now its "you do it? your out, no warnings"

- - - Updated - - -



they will not be firing people just becuase someone says "X did Y" they will launch investigations because of such, but they wont fire just on word.

Blizzard has gotten themselves into some serious shit. My...how the king has fallen so far to this humbling state.


Let us see if they learn anything from all this

[MrLachyG]

Is it though? I mean, if you needed dangerous surgery to save your life, would you prefer to be operated on by a surgeon who got their position by showing proven experience and expertise in their field or a surgeon who got the job over the experienced experts because of their age/gender/skin colour/sexuality/etc ticked a box on a diversity form?

Employers should always hire the best person for the job, the person that has worked hardest and gained the most experience or proven in some way that they are the best choice for the job. As other people have already pointed out a company can't have a diverse workforce if the industry as a whole does not have a diverse workforce.

In my opinion, I think that diversity should be monitored for abuse, so HR departments should have audits of applications for a role to check the successful applicants were chosen because they were the best and not because of the interviewer's personal bias. At the moment it feels like diversity is simply looked at for the raw numbers and nothing more, x company has 75% male staff so they need to hire more women, rather than looking at why the company has more male staff. Did many women apply for the position? Of those that did, were any the best candidate for the position? Does the industry generally just have that many more male workers?

A workplace where everyone was hired for their skills is better than a workplace where everyone was hired based on a diversity quota.

Is that actually how it works though? Would they hire someone with no qualifications straight out of high school over someone with a degree? No, of course not.

They also can’t discriminate, obviously, but they still can increase how many women are on their workforce by doing things listed here: https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtoo...ty-goals-.aspx