Published , by TJ Denzer
Published , by TJ Denzer
The unionized employees of Bethesda have made a move to push back against reportedly unfair business practices by parent companies ZeniMax and Microsoft. Employees in Maryland and Texas organized a one-day strike in an effort to bring the parent companies to the negotiating table for topics including remote work and outsourcing of certain departments.
The Bethesda one-day strike was announced this week, as reported by Inverse. Around 300+ workers are represented by the Bethesda union, which walked off the job this week to protest a variety of concerns that the employees feel have gone unaddressed. That includes the mandatory return-to-office policies, which require employees to come to on-site work two days out of the week. However, the employees feel these policies don’t appropriately accommodate those who do remote work.
Another issue brought up in the strike is the use of quality assurance testing outsourced to third-party firms. The group is pushing for more full-time QA testers on staff, which would increase its bargaining power in turn.
The Bethesda union was voted into existence around December 2022. It has worked to try to ensure and secure rights for the workers involved at said company and in turn has become the second largest video game industry union in the US. With that said, Microsoft has also caught flak as of late for its part in massive video game and tech company layoffs in 2024, shedding around 2,500 employees this year.
With this strike, it will be interesting to see how ZeniMax and Microsoft respond to the union. Stay tuned as we watch for the latest news and updates on this story.