CEO Also Apologizes Following the IGN Report of Past Toxic Workplace
Bungie’s head of HR, Gayle d’Hondt, has decided to step down from the position of senior of people relations within Bungie. Whether she will stay with the company is currently unknown, but it is a possibility.
After the upsetting in-depth report of how the company’s attitude was, and how it has been changing, it isn’t surprising that there is a shuffling of the deck, so to speak. Though there have been some (cough, Blizzard, cough), that have stuck with their guns for baffling reasons outside viewers do not seem to understand, Bungie is not one of them. But, by the sounds of it, d’Hondt made this choice herself, and spoke of how there needed to be trust between HR and the employees.
“I know that they need to be trusted to be your advocates – not labeled as ‘enablers’ or seen as company resources who provide bad actors with safe harbor,” was seen in the email. This follows a complaint of one of the employees about the distrust currently between HR and the other departments.
“It’s a well-known fact, if you talk to HR you’re putting your own job on the line,” one employee was quoted as saying. “HR has never been there to protect employees. They’ve always been there to protect the company. I’ve watched it happen a few times at Bungie, where someone went to HR and things went completely sideways for them.”
But it seems that not everyone was free of possible harassment. d’Hondt revealed that in her work within the company for 14 years, that she also faced abuse from, “a man, an executive, and someone I thought was my friend at Bungie — which resulted in Bungie firing him.”
This did not happen with everyone though. Bungie CEO Pete Parsons stepped up after the IGN report though and issued an apology. “Speaking with the team at Bungie,” he said, “reading the stories, and seeing both known and newly surfaced accounts, it is clear we still have work ahead of us.”
Indeed. Let’s hope actions are taken for the sake of the employees of Bungie.