Since November 2024, workers at Don’t Nod have been fighting to save their jobs and mitigate the social disaster in the form of a layoffs plan that studio management put forward.
We maintain that this plan is a desperate move by management to address their own decisions that ended up putting the studio in a difficult situation. Workers are paying the price for management’s shortcomings, and are held hostage by company heads who only offered a choice between a devastating layoffs plan (PSE) or an even darker future, since it was out of the question for Don’t Nod’s bosses to look inwards.
The social movement reached a climax with a renewable strike followed by around a hundred workers from January 13th to 17th. Our colleagues’ resolve to hold their heads high and to stick to demands that ensured they were respected in the process forced management to actually take negotiations seriously and reach an agreement that we will describe here.
Terms of the agreement
Management’s initial offer
Initially, the plan was to cut 69 jobs within the company, among a list of professional categories.
People within those categories could get reassigned, or choose a voluntary redundancy from the company by presenting a « robust » professional project (having a new job in sight, creating or taking over a company, getting training in a new matter).
Those remaining would’ve then been ranked according to criteria that would determine who would be fired, if the total was not yet reached.
Anyone losing their job would’ve been compensated by the legal minimum, that is the Indemnité Conventionnelle de Licenciement (ICL) – the collective bargain-imposed minimum firing compensation as defined in the SYNTEC collective agreement:
- For people classified as ETAM (technicians):
- up to 10 years of seniority: ¼ of gross monthly salary per year of seniority within the company
- over 10 years of seniority: ⅓ of gross monthly salary per year of seniority within the company
- For people classified as « cadres » (untranslatable notion, sorry):
- up to 2 years of seniority: ¼ of gross monthly salary per year of seniority within the company
- over 2 years of seniority: ⅓ of gross monthly salary per year of seniority within the company
Those who would choose a voluntary redundancy would get a premium of 1500 €.
What we obtained
In accordance with our colleagues who fought for their rights, the STJV union negotiation group was able to wring out the following:
Widened scope for voluntary redundancies
The ability to request a voluntary reundancy will be open to more professional categories, some of which are not targeted for jobs cuts.
This could save up to 23 jobs, by letting those who wish to leave go even if they were not intended to, avoiding in return a forced job cut.
What’s more, the number of jobs being cut has been reduced from 69 to 49, since there were numerous resignations since management announced the PSE, and thanks also to adjustments to management’s plan following some of the CSE’s (workers council) observations when it was informed.
Less indignant terms to leave the company
Anyone who loses their job, ETAM or cadre, will benefit from an ICL that will use the more favorable conditions normally reserved to cadres.
It will be completed by an extra-legal compensation paid by Don’t Nod. The bonus for choosing a voluntary redundacy is removed to improve this extra-legal compensation. We focused on protecting those in the most precarious situations and who may have the harder time finding a new job, and they would also be the least likely to choose voluntary redundacy.
As a result, anyone who leaves the company, voluntarily or not, will be compensated by whichever formula yields the highest number:
- ICL (cadre) + 13 000€
- 2× ICL (cadre)
Payment of the strike
No day of strike that was followed between January 13th and January 17th will be cut from one’s salary.
The strike fund we set up will pay for the earlier strike days from November and December, and any remaining funds will be transferred to the STJV’s national strike fund, as announced during its creation.
Conclusion
We want to thank and congratulate our colleagues for their part in this historic and successful mobilization. Their support and their solidarity were outstanding.
This victory would not have been reached without the titanic work of the CSE (that was elected under the STJV’s banner) and the Don’t Nod STJV union section, over 4 months.
And crucially, we send warm thanks to all of those who supported us and who filled the coffers of the strike fund.
Collective action gets results, it is our best weapon.
Of course, this PSE leaves a bitter taste, and the struggle will continue for both our remaining colleagues’ working conditions as well as for the uncertain future that those who will be laid off will have to face.
It is not, and it will never be satisfactory to see people be fired. We hope that this struggle will be a stepping stone on which to weigh and from which to start, if any company out there did not get the memo.
Hurrah to strikers, and hurrah to strikes!
To whom it may concern
We said that about Don’t Nod, we also said it about the industry as a whole: this circus is done. Our efforts to raise awareness and to identify and denounce the gross violations of labour law in the games industry are bearing fruits, and the strike on February 13th proved that clearly.
We will keep supporting the workers in all of the sector’s companies to reach similar victories, and even bigger ones yet.