Good for them. Though, I wonder how this ever was allowed to get this bad in the first place[0]. Perhaps it's how I was raised, my employment history, or I've just "gotten lucky" with (larger) employers[1], but it blows my mind that any large employer allowed an employee to come within a 100 yards of harassing behavior.
I worked in various lead/senior roles in IT Infrastructure, security, support and development at a 5,000-20,000 (depending on the time) employee telecom. I know of one incident in the 17 years I was there that was serious related to sexual harassment. In that case, the "victimized employee" remained with the company, the harasser handled by suspension during a (hours long) investigation where they were fired with cause (also the only case in the US that I'm aware of). I was asked to collect his computer; yeah, firing him was a good call.
Women and minorities in IT -- both technical and management (VP was and currently still is the same woman) were represented well above the average[2] and promoted at no different rate. On our team and among our larger team -- 17 years -- all of the staff acted like adults (some had quirks, but nothing more). I don't ever recall a frat-boy like attitude and I know none of my co-workers would tolerate it. I don't even recall an incident of inappropriate humor. The only thing that came close was one colleague who dropped an F-Bomb casually about every 3 words (usually a "Fckin'" or "Fcked Up" -- despite the word, I don't recall him using the word sexually). He lasted a year or so and didn't get fired for the F-Bombs -- everyone talked about it but nobody really cared[3].
[0] In fairness, I've not followed this story closely, so that may be my perception.
[1] The tempting explanation of "I didn't experience it, myself, therefore I was blind to it" isn't something I can prove I wasn't affected by, but my unusual set of jobs/position in the company allowed for few places to hide this kind of behavior from me at times.
[2] I'm always uncomfortable mentioning this -- we had higher than average because we actively recruited from places that would increase the number of minority candidates. We did not in any way apply hiring practices that favored under-represented races/genders -- and ended up having a very diverse team.
[3] I'm not suggesting harassing/racist behavior be ignored, however, another part of being an adult is tolerating things that we feel are "moral faults" in others without being uptight about it. "It takes a lot of people to make a world" ... My casually-swearing colleague never swore at people or about people -- he swore about things sometimes, and swore casually, even though he chose a word that many in the US feel to be among the most offensive profanities, co-workers used to just comment about "how strange it is to hear so much profanity out of one guy when nobody else is swearing at all".
I've been a woman in this field for 30-odd years and I'm surprised at the stories coming out. The harassment that I've known of happen 'behind closed doors' with senior leaders - terrible and inexcusable but nothing like the relentless frat-boy behavior described at Blizzard. I've been on teams which would make HR's hair stand on end but even on those the insults flew in all directions, I never felt picked out for my gender.
It's clear that at Blizzard there was a culture of harassment which was effectively bullying. I wouldn't' be surprised to find that men who didn't participate were picked on too. I don't think that changes when a few heads roll at the top. I don't know how to change that honestly.
In telecom you get to work with real living adults, media industries are rife with exploitation because they're peoples "dream jobs".
If you read the legal complaint filed by the state of california, blizzard had gaming lounges with booze that people would often walk in on a couple having sex. At work.
Those of us who can't imagine working at a place like that should just consider ourselves lucky.
... feeling badly for picking on F-Bomb guy and I remembered a story about him that I thought I'd share as context when I say he never landed in harassment territory.
He worked at an office in a different state, but I worked closely with his team and he had been put on a team that my former boss had chosen to move across the country to be a member of. Apparently Bill (former boss[0], not his real name) met John (F-Bomb guy, same) two days after he started; they got to talking, John found out Bill had a moving truck coming that weekend and invited himself over to help, even buying lunch for him, my former boss and the one other guy who was willing to help.
[0] Not his boss, not even on the same team and they'd met that day -- it was one of several stories; we'd often wondered if the profanity was a mental thing because he otherwise behaved like a Sunday School teacher.
I've been f-bomb guy before. Cursing (not for cursings sake, but for the love of the language, if there is such a thing) is a crucial part of my language and when I was younger, before I moved into technical leadership roles, I didn't quite understand why it was unprofessional language to use at work... But sspecially so when everything else abut the job felt so casual. In the last 5 years, however, I have been involved in technical leadership and have restricted my usage.
FWIW, I'm also the type to insist on helping friends and colleagues with physical labor work.
Yeah, I spent about 4 years working in construction and factory floors and another 4 years in the military. It's baked in at this point but I've learned to get it under control when needed.
IMO it's because of the industry. I have worked in the Video Game industry and there are a mix of reasons why I see people sticking around through these types of issues:
1. They are a non-STEM role and this is one of the best jobs for them.
2. It is a video game company. The amount of STEM professionals that I know sticking around in low-growth, high-stress, overwork, and toxic environments is worth it to them because the industry is "fun".
I think a lot of time leaders/companies know they have employees hooked in these roles and don't focus on improving culture because of it.
To be honest, I would leave a place that tries to improve culture. Either the employees carry decent behavior themselves or not. You can enforce it to a degree, but that will never be not toxic.
That said, business environments are most often "clean". That has advantages and disadvantages. But it allows you to work without distraction.
Culture comes from the top, from every hire, and is something that needs to be managed. It includes firing or outing people that do not carry decent behavior and promoting good behavior.
Completely agree, and it's really complicated to do right. I've been blessed to work for some great bosses and great organizations in my life. I've worked at one or two lousy ones along the way, too, but one thing I've noticed is that problems like this become disasters when people aren't comfortable talking to leadership.
At the "Great Organizations" -- both had founders and CEOs who's "Open Door Policy" wasn't just paper. Both had more complications than a typical company of being able to actually execute on an "Open Door Policy" -- one being fully remote with global (evenly distributed) staff, the other is in-office/global. They both took the time to make employees comfortable enough to be willing to speak up -- to them, if necessary -- in the face of difficulty/evil.
The place I'm at, now, it is a core principal of how the company functions. I don't recall the founders actually saying this was a core principal and I don't think it's written on any walls in the office. However, on day #1, I was set up with a laptop, all of the appropriate credentials and a meeting on my calendar with one of the founders scheduled about two weeks from now.
By Noon on day 1, I had casually talked to both founders four times. If there were a few people in the kitchen, one of them would introduce me to them[1]. By the next day, the founder who I ultimately had the 1:1 with was asking about my kids, by name. By the time the two weeks had passed, it almost seemed silly to have a 1:1 and I've never had another scheduled -- if the founders were in the office, I often talked to them multiple times a day[2]. I would have expected this at a single-office, 5-developer shop kind-of-place but not at a 150+ shop with offices on both coasts and Europe.
Leadership at some companies try to "gimmick" the whole "Open Door Policy" by doing things like "The CEO sits with all of the rest of us"[3]. Our founders have amazing glass-all-around (with window-shades) offices with a really nice lobby area. Our desks were/are pretty basic. I've never thought of it and never heard anyone comment on it in relation to its affects on open communication. 99.999% of the time both glass doors are open, the shades are up and I have walked in there without prompting on multiple occasions. I have been asked questions like "What could we fix with this/that" expecting answers that one would expect "they might not want to hear". I'm a more extroverted individual, so I was comfortable pretty quickly, but I've seen the most introverted members of staff talk like they're "old friends" with the two founders. The only thing I can attribute it to is that they are relentless about having a real open door policy.
Many take discomfort talking openly to people with authority over them, however, if there were ever a "general vaccination" against Blizzard Culture, I'd imagine "a company where every member of staff feels comfortable telling the founders exactly what is wrong, when it is wrong, without fear of being fired" is a principle that goes a long way toward solving that sort of problem. It solves a million others and allow for things like really flat reporting structures. There was one situation a couple of years ago involving a very complex project and even more complex customer that I know I would have quit were it not for the knowledge that I could talk about my concerns, be trusted, and have them addressed -- most of the time I can handle things on my own and just the knowledge of that is enough. Outside of that, I don't think this company could exist without an open communications policy -- our product is "creations/inventions[4]".
[0] And well at that -- not your typical, "here's the new guy" but "this is Matt, we hired him because he really loves Baz-lang -- you should talk to him about that issue on the Foo project"
[1] As "culture comes from the top", if I misjudged a company and discovered during a 1:1 that the CEO/etc was a horrible human being, I'd like to know that as soon as possible so that I can start finding alternative employment. And any CEO (assuming 500 or fewer employees) who wouldn't have time to carve out a single 30 minute meeting after hiring a senior member of technical staff raises a few red flags on its own.
[2] This was partly helped by the fact that my desk was between the kitchen and their offices.
[3] I even had a buddy in a senior role at a software company, locally, where the CEO participated in a roll call every morning. He sat in a standard cubicle away from windows.
[4] I'm not entirely sure what I'm not supposed to share, but we've created a few IoT products; I did the Alexa/Gooble implementation for a device that's sold at Walmart/Target/the likes from a company that's a household name in a lot of the world for their category. We do a lot of different categories, though, including designing the customer experience of a retail store for a massive technology brand. I think the two old-school table-top Microsoft Surface PCs in the lobby won me over, though.
I worked in various lead/senior roles in IT Infrastructure, security, support and development at a 5,000-20,000 (depending on the time) employee telecom. I know of one incident in the 17 years I was there that was serious related to sexual harassment. In that case, the "victimized employee" remained with the company, the harasser handled by suspension during a (hours long) investigation where they were fired with cause (also the only case in the US that I'm aware of). I was asked to collect his computer; yeah, firing him was a good call.
Women and minorities in IT -- both technical and management (VP was and currently still is the same woman) were represented well above the average[2] and promoted at no different rate. On our team and among our larger team -- 17 years -- all of the staff acted like adults (some had quirks, but nothing more). I don't ever recall a frat-boy like attitude and I know none of my co-workers would tolerate it. I don't even recall an incident of inappropriate humor. The only thing that came close was one colleague who dropped an F-Bomb casually about every 3 words (usually a "Fckin'" or "Fcked Up" -- despite the word, I don't recall him using the word sexually). He lasted a year or so and didn't get fired for the F-Bombs -- everyone talked about it but nobody really cared[3].
[0] In fairness, I've not followed this story closely, so that may be my perception.
[1] The tempting explanation of "I didn't experience it, myself, therefore I was blind to it" isn't something I can prove I wasn't affected by, but my unusual set of jobs/position in the company allowed for few places to hide this kind of behavior from me at times.
[2] I'm always uncomfortable mentioning this -- we had higher than average because we actively recruited from places that would increase the number of minority candidates. We did not in any way apply hiring practices that favored under-represented races/genders -- and ended up having a very diverse team.
[3] I'm not suggesting harassing/racist behavior be ignored, however, another part of being an adult is tolerating things that we feel are "moral faults" in others without being uptight about it. "It takes a lot of people to make a world" ... My casually-swearing colleague never swore at people or about people -- he swore about things sometimes, and swore casually, even though he chose a word that many in the US feel to be among the most offensive profanities, co-workers used to just comment about "how strange it is to hear so much profanity out of one guy when nobody else is swearing at all".