Among the many professions of the gambling industry, Quality Assurance Department (QA) testers are rarely related to: often these jobs are precarious, the studios using temporary workers in the framework of punctual missions ( Intensive tests for a few weeks before launching a game or the output of a sparger update, for example).

By way of communicating, Activision Blizzard announces its intention to hold 1100 of these temporary testers ** to offer them a full-time job within its workforce from July 1st. As of April 17, group testers will also benefit from a salary increase (the upgraded minimum wage of 20 monthly dollars), in addition to the benefits granted to group employees.

Beyond the announcement, this wave of hires is nevertheless enrolled in a tense social context within the group. Last December, Activision Blizzard had already offered full-time jobs at 500 of his testers… but had also dismissed a dozen in his subsidiary Raven Software – a group studio who works in particular on The Call of Duty license. Dismissals that had aroused some emotion, both because of the inequality of treatment between the testers of the various studios of the group and the little consideration for those of Raven (some concerned had for example moved to their expense in Wisconsin To reach the studio before being thanked).

Since then, Raven Software’s testers are on strike and regularly arrange debases, and mainly plan to create a union within Activision Blizzard . But we know, the American unions are very powerful, very dreaded by the leaders of companies and those of Activision Blizzard are very hostile to the unionization of their employees – the group has for example organized a campaign aimed at demonstrating that the unions Are not the advantage of employees and refused to recognize the creation of the union created by the Raven employees (which is therefore the subject of a procedure before the National Labor Relations Board_).

In this context, Raven’s testers are excluded from the recruitment offer initiated by Activision Blizzard. According to the Game Workers Alliance, the hires would therefore target employees and stifle in the egg the risk of creating a large union bringing together all Blizzard Activision testers. According to the Activision frameworks, Raven’s employees are excluded from the operation for legal reasons: the group relies on a 1964 court decision that would prohibit a society from offering social benefits to employees involved in a social conflict ongoing (equated by buying social peace, failing to settle the social conflict). The studio therefore officially denies any link between hiring and the desire to create the union.
For the record, Activision Blizzard is currently being redemst by Microsoft , whose executives have already indicated that they would not oppose the creation of a union within the (new) group.