Blizzard Entertainment’s Chief Legal Officer Resigns

The latest departure from Blizzard Entertainment may have far-reaching effects.

It is never a good sign when your chief legal officer resigns, which is exactly what happened when Blizzard Entertainment’s Chief Legal Officer Claire Hart resigned on September 20 after three years with the company. The chief legal officer ensures that the company complies with all local, state, and federal laws. Whether or not Hart’s resignation is related to the current situation at Activision Blizzard is unclear. She did not mention the situation in her post.

Credit: Activision Blizzard

Hart wrote in a LinkedIn post, “After more than three years at Blizzard Entertainment, I have decided to move on to my next adventure. Friday was my last day. The past three years have been full of unexpected twists and turns, but I feel honored to have worked with and met so many great people at Blizzard and across the Activision Blizzard businesses.”

Blizzard Entertainment has failed to address numerous complaints by employees.

For the past two months, Blizzard has been embroiled in a lawsuit brought forth by the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing (DFEH), and a massive walkout from Activision Blizzard employees. Many players have since vowed to quit playing Blizzard games. Content creators have decided not to stream or create videos for Blizzard games completely in the past two months. The situation came to a head when the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), in relation to the DFEH lawsuit and employee complaints about sexual misconduct and discrimination, subpoenaed Activision CEO Bobby Kotick and other high-ranking executives.

Hart is the latest in departures from Activision Blizzard in 2021, joining former Blizzard president J. Allen Brack, Diablo 4 game director Luis Barriga, lead designer Jesse McCree, and World of Warcraft designer Jonathan LeCraft. Kotick himself has pledged to clean house in the past two months. “We will not just terminate employees where appropriate, but we’ll also terminate any manager or leader found to have impeded the integrity of our processes for evaluating claims and imposing appropriate consequences,” he said. Blizzard has changed some in-game references to former employees such as Jesse McCree and Alex Afrasiabi. However, the company has done little to nothing to improve working conditions.