Microsoft to work with unions, with eye on Activision

Bloomberg

Microsoft Corp said it will work with labour groups when workers wish to join them, taking a pre-emptive stance amid a wave of union organising in the tech industry and ahead of its acquisition of Activision Blizzard Inc, home of the first labour union in the gaming industry.
In a blog post outlining the company’s principles on engaging with employees, Microsoft President and Vice Chair Brad Smith wrote that workers “will never need to organise to have a dialogue with Microsoft’s leaders,” but that the software giant recognises some employees in some countries may choose to join a labour organisation.
“We respect this right, and do not believe our employees or company’s other stakeholders benefit by resisting lawful employee efforts to participate in protected activities, including forming or joining a union,” Smith wrote in the post. “We are committed to creative and collaborative approaches with unions when employees wish
to exercise their rights and
Microsoft is presented with a
specific unionisation proposal.”
The Redmond, Washington-based company is seeking regulatory approval for its $69 billion purchase of Activision, which was announced in January. Video game testers at Activision Blizzard’s Raven Software subsidiary voted on last month to form a union with the Communications Workers of America, a first for a US-listed game company. Nineteen quality assurance testers at Raven, who assess the performance of games in lucrative Call of Duty series, voted for legal recognition of the union they’d first
organised in January.
Microsoft’s statement comes against the backdrop of a swell of labour organisation in the US, including in industries and at companies where such efforts have traditionally struggled or failed. Among recent actions at other Seattle-area companies, workers at more than 60 Starbucks Corp locations in 17 states have voted to join Workers United, an affiliate of the Service Employees International Union.
, following the lead and advice of first-mover baristas in Buffalo. Staffers at about 175 more Starbucks have petitioned the federal government for votes of their own. And Amazon.com Inc. workers at a New York warehouse voted to join an upstart labour union, ending more than 25 years in which company managed to keep unions out.
Smith said Microsoft sees that the workplace is changing. “While relationships with labour organisations are not new to Microsoft, we know that we have a lot to learn,” he wrote.