Hasbro Hit With Layoffs, Wizards of the Coast Impacted

Hasbro has announced they had laid off "less than 100" employees, with Wizards of the Coast and the Dungeons & Dragons team impacted as a result. Hasbro announced the "operational streamlining" of their team ahead of their third quarter earnings report, along with several organizational changes impacting oversight of different business lines. as part of these business realignments, Chief Marketing Officer Jason Bunge will now oversee Wizards of the Coast and digital marketing moving forward.

EN World has learned that at least four people at Wizards of the Coast were laid off as part of these changes. One of the four is Dixon Dubow, who publicly announced that he was laid off on Twitter yesterday. Dubow was the creator relations manager for Dungeons & Dragons and was a critical part of helping to repair D&D's image after the 2023 OGL scandal. Dubow was a primary point of contact for content creators who worked with the D&D brand.

Hasbro previously laid off a number of Wizards of the Coast employees as part of a wider employee reduction line last year. Numerous employees from various Wizards teams were either laid off or retired as part of a 20% reduction in the overall Hasbro workforce.

Hasbro also announced year to date operating profits of $630 million during their quarterly earnings report, with a $98 million dividend payout to shareholders.

 

[Umbran]

How does a problem being around for years make it not a problem? If anything, it makes it worse.

Two things:

1) When it only comes up when Hasbro/WotC does it, it seems hard to argue that it is about the overall societal situation, and seems more that folks want to display displeasure at Hasbro. Especially when none of these posts are even accompanied by, "I just sent WotC a note to give them a piece of my mind!" If folks are not visibly taking the most basic action of informing the company of their displeasure directly, it seems a little off as a response.

2) (trying to keep this within the no-politics rules of the site - we'll try to keep this a basic economic point)

Before we declare this a, "problem," we might want to turn it around and consider the alternative. Imagine, for a moment, that hiring came with an expectation/requirement of sustained employment for 5+ years. Added up across all employees, that's a significant financial commitment. What would that do to corporate bookkeeping and finances, having those greater standing liabilities? Wouldn't we expect that companies would hire fewer people as a result? Would the person have had the job to get laid off from in that situation? Would that job have existed? Would the products that person's job related to even exist in that different business environment?

 

[Parmandur]

(trying to keep this within the no-politics rules of the site - we'll try to keep this a basic economic point)

Before we declare this a, "problem," we might want to turn it around and consider the alternative. Imagine, for a moment, that hiring came with an expectation/requirement of sustained employment for 5+ years. Added up across all employees, that's a significant financial commitment. What would that do to corporate bookkeeping and finances, having those greater standing liabilities? Wouldn't we expect that companies would hire fewer people as a result? Would the person have had the job to get laid off from in that situation? Would that job have existed? Would the products that person's job related to even exist in that different business environment?

I can't respond in detail, buuuut...real life examples of this as broader social policy do exist.

I will say this is upstream of Hasbro and WotC in terms of any possibility of change. Hate the game, not the player.

 

[Umbran]

Most companies wait until late 4th Quarter to do their layoffs--which means most folks end up getting laid off around Christmas. That seems like it would be even worse.

Yeah. We as a culture have chosen to have our major cultural festivals around where our fiscal year ends. That has some consequences.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

Two things:

1) When it only comes up when Hasbro/WotC does it, it seems hard to argue that it is about the overall societal situation, and seems more that folks want to display displeasure at Hasbro.

What are you talking about!? We aren't allowed to talk about "overall societal situations" here on ENWorld - you'd have to Mod us for it. We're only allowed to talk about what directly effects the game industry, and only very carefully.

Especially when none of these posts are even accompanied by, "I just sent WotC a note to give them a piece of my mind!" If folks are not visibly taking the most basic action of informing the company of their displeasure directly, it seems a little off as a response.

I don't think it seems strange at all to voice opinions on the article at the start of the thread. That's the whole point of the site.

2) (trying to keep this within the no-politics rules of the site - we'll try to keep this a basic economic point)

Yeah, exactly.

Before we declare this a, "problem," we might want to turn it around and consider the alternative. Imagine, for a moment, that hiring came with an expectation/requirement of sustained employment for 5+ years.

Oh, c'mon - you know that it's not about an inability to fire dead weight. That certainly happens, too, and it's a completely different problem. No one is complaining about a company being able to fire an employee for just cause. This is about companies firing perfectly fine employees on a regular basis just to bolster stocks.

And before you jump on the flaw above, yes, we don't 100% know that these particular, individual firings weren't justified, but again, we're not talking about that. (And it seems that there is reason to believe that @SlyFlourish's acquaintance, at least, was doing good and important work). You really think that Hasbro had 100 people that were bad at their jobs and needed to be fired?

Added up across all employees, that's a significant financial commitment. What would that do to corporate bookkeeping and finances, having those greater standing liabilities?

They had 98 million to give to shareholders. All 100 people's salaries didn't add up to anywhere near that, guaranteed.

Wouldn't we expect that companies would hire fewer people as a result? Would the person have had the job to get laid off from in that situation? Would that job have existed? Would the products that person's job related to even exist in that different business environment?

Your hypothetical is pointless, IMO, as it's so far in the opposite direction from what's happening that there's a whole world of "middle-grounds" between the two.

 

[bedir than]

At this point I honestly don't care. If you went to work for WotC in the last 20+ years, you know they're doing these on the regular, you knew what you were getting into.

They're getting into a job that pays rather well in one of the most desirable markets in the United States, as opposed to the vast majority of RPG companies that nearly require a second job in order to live in a similar region.

 

[Blue]

If your goal is to minimize layoffs, this is not the correct strategy. Just sayin'.

I'm not the person you were reply to, but I want to step in.

I see what you are saying, and strongly disagree. They made hundreds of millions of profits, the layoffs have nothing to do with insufficient sales or not enough cashflow to pay people. So they will occur regardless if some people buy or not. So at the very worst, it's entirely neutral.

But, voting with your wallet is one of the few ways to get companies (operating legally) to listen. This is what happened with the OGL debacle, where they came out with their response, and out-and-out lied (about approaching companies early and the NDAs) but then they started hemorrhaging DnDBeyond subscriptions.

So yes, it is the correct strategy.

 

[CleverNickName]

So yes, it is the correct strategy.

Well, it's one strategy, out of several.

For example, you could also call or write them--Wizards of the Coast makes thousands of sales every day, but probably only receives a handful of letters from their customers. So they might not notice a few customers not buying their latest Whatever, but they might notice a letter, email, or voicemail (even if they decline to respond.) If you want to send them a message with the highest signal-to-noise ratio, you could pick up your phone or pick up a pen.

But if the goal is to force Hasbro to stop laying people off, you're going to be unsuccessful. Hasbro is a corporation, and is beholden to the rules and infrastructure that all corporations operate under. Sure, they are the biggest name in roleplaying games, but they don't control the entire capitalist economy.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

We as a culture have chosen to have our major cultural festivals around where our fiscal year ends.

I'm not sure that's the order in which that happened.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Yeah. We as a culture have chosen to have our major cultural festivals around where our fiscal year ends. That has some consequences.

More the other way around really.

 

[MGibster]

And people here are a tad bit unreasonable. Do you expect that people keep working at the company when they don't get fired? If they leave, are they suddenly bad people and are traitors? Especially if they leave for another better paying job? No, that's 'normal', so why the different standards?

You're right. Most of the United States have what we call "at will" employment meaning either party can terminate employment at any time. But as we all know, just because you can do something doesn't mean it's right. I can quit my job any any time I choose, but most of my coworkers and management would expect a minimum of a two week notice. I'd be burning bridges if I just walked out this afternoon after announcing my immediate resignation. In this particular case, the problem is that many people perceive this as unfair. WotC is posting good profits and they've laid off the employees who helped make the company successful.

You have a contract with your employer, where you can leave with X amount of notice and they can fire you with Y amount of notice. Why are companies => people 'evil' when they follow the contract both parties agreed to?

One thing I have to frequently explain to Europeans is that the vast majority of Americans do not have employment contracts. In my 31 years of working as an American, I have never had a contract with my employer. The only state in the United States that doesn't have at will employment is Montana.