As Ubisoft undergoes a massive shakeup that’s impacting the well-being of its employees, the company’s staff has said that a recent internal town hall meeting didn’t assuage concerns about their futures.
Ubisoft held an internal town hall meeting on February 4. According to a recording of the town hall sent to Insider Gaming and a dozen anonymous employees who spoke to the outlet, employee morale is sinking. They said that the meeting was “an expert class” in dodging questions as executives opted to sidestep inquiries and recycle statements around three key issues: the return-to-office mandate, headcount reduction intentions, and the five creative houses’ creation.
Speaking on the return-to-office mandate, Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot reiterated that the decision was to improve employee morale and team collaboration.
“It’s a decision we have not taken lightly, but we feel strongly that it will bring more efficiency, innovation, and velocity,” he said. “As it already has since we came back, three days per week. Working in person brings stronger performance, especially in the tech and creative industries.”
Chief studios and portfolio officer Marie-Sophie de Waubert underscored Guillemot’s comments, clarifying that Ubisoft isn’t pondering a four-day workweek because they hear “internally and externally” that creative teams work better when next to each other.
“What we hear, both internally and externally, is that when it comes to creative, the more people that are present together, the more all of those things we mentioned earlier improve from a collective perspective,” de Waubert said. “We have already explained this in the past, and our position remains the same; we are not considering a four-day office workplace.”
Guillemot corroborated these sentiments, saying that the “only objective” the company has is to “get Ubisoft back on the right path” and share in the successes and profits. He also clarified that it’s the team’s “strengths and collective talents” that allow Ubisoft to succeed.
When talking about the headcount reduction–which could see at least 200 French staffers lose their jobs–CFO Frederik Duguet said that, although the restructuring will produce some redundancies, any other figures haven’t been publicly disclosed.
“First of all, we must state very clearly that we have never shared such numbers externally, and as I’ve just said, we won’t share any more decisions today,” Duguet said. “Again, it is, however, true that we will proceed with additional targeting restructuring as we need to resize the organisation and reduce our costs.”
With staff learning about Ubisoft’s decisions at the same time as everyone else, executive vice president Cécile Russeil acknowledged that transparent communication is important to the company.
“We heard you, and in the future, we will attach the press release with an internal email so that you get all of the information at the same time [as the] media and investors.”
Lastly, Duguet discussed the five creative houses Ubisoft established to oversee various franchises and projects. He noted that the company wants these teams to succeed and that they “might not be profitable on day one.” Should they continue to “underperform versus management expectations,” though, he confirmed that selling a house is certainly a possibility as long as the sale is “good for the house or Ubisoft” in its long-term vision.
This comes amid tensions between Ubisoft management and staff. With employees feeling “anger and despair” over looming layoffs and a developer who criticized the return-to-office mandate being fired, the company’s various unions are requesting a three-day work stoppage from February 10-12 and calling for CEO Yves Guillemot to resign amid these challenges.