CEO Fredrik Wester took to Twitter yesterday to address an "incident" in 2018 where he exhibited "inappropriate behavior" with a female employee. However, this incident did not lead to his ousting as Paradox's CEO as some might have speculated.
Wester only just recently returned to the role of CEO at Paradox Interactive after resigning back in 2018. He was replaced by Ebba Ljungerud, who resigned her position two weeks ago over "differing views on the company's strategy going forward." Wester was announced as Ljungerud's replacement, coming back in after serving as Paradox's chairman of the board.
Soon after Paradox announced its changing of the guard, Swedish tech site Breakit released a bombshell report alleging over half of Paradox staff reported being mistreated at the workplace in an internal survey. Respondents said Paradox had a "culture of silence" around mistreatment and abuse, mirroring recent reports against other big publishers such as Ubisoft and Activision Blizzard.
The timing of this report certainly wasn’t good for Wester, and with rumors of a 2018 incident swirling, Paradox’s new CEO felt it was best to set the record straight on social media.
"In the wake of the recently leaked survey to the press, there have been rumors and discussions about my role in this environment, citing a specific incident in 2018,” wrote Wester on Twitter. “ In the name of transparency and clarity, I would like to shed light on this. Accountability starts from the top.
“Beginning of 2018, we held a company-wide conference, and during this gathering,a Paradox employee was subject to inappropriate behavior from me personally. This was something I immediately and sincerely apologized for in person the following Monday in a process reviewed by HR."
Wester didn't offer any additional details on the incident, only that he is working with a "coach and mentor" to learn from the incident and improve himself.
Wester also said that the incident "had nothing to do with me resigning as CEO in 2018, something that had been planned for over 6 months at the time it occurred."
Paradox is still reeling from the Breakit report and has hired an outside firm to review its HR policies and conduct a more thorough survey of current Paradox employees. Wester reiterated his commitment to improving Paradox’s work environment and apologized for the 2018 incident.
“Everyone should have the right to be comfortable and safe, especially around a person in a position of power such as myself, something I stated then and I am stating again now,” he added.