In my first newsletter of 2024, I want to reflect on the utter travesty of 2023 for so many employees. I can only hope for common sense to prevail this year.

Of course, I am talking about the return-to-office mandates being issued by so many organisations.

The bribery

They tried bribery before the bullying.

Google asked employees to return to the office three days a week, luring them with free food and perks before telling them to return three days a week or have their non-attendance included in their performance reviews. Google also tried to sweeten the commute by offering a $99 per night “Summer Special” sale for an on-campus hotel. The offer said, “Just imagine no commute to the office in the morning and instead, you could have an extra hour of sleep and less friction.”

Salesforce tried pulling on the heartstrings by donating $10 to a local charity every day an employee went into the office.

Many tried to bribe employees with a better office experience. Architects designing Uber’s new headquarters bragged about luxuries, including operable windows, outdoor terraces, and a wellness centre with hanging swing seats. According to the Guardian, one architect explained that they had designed a floor overlooking greenery to make “employees feel like they’re in a tree house.”

In New York’s mid-town, a real estate firm installed a professional-level virtual golf links that uses infrared cameras to analyse your swing. Brian Wallick, the director of investments at Nuveen Real Estate, told the New York Post that “adding an amenity like golf simulators helps to foster collaboration as part of a unique user experience, especially in a commercial office building”.

The bullying

Executives have been bullying employees to return to the office by threatening them with job losses or pay cuts. These are just some of them.

Amazon      

CNN reported that Amazon CEO Andy Jassy told employees to get on board with the company’s return-to-office plan or to consider employment elsewhere.

He also predicted that for those who could not accept the policy, their prospects for remaining at Amazon appeared grim.

As the World Socialist Web Site put it:

“In an example of ruling class arrogance and brutality, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy has ordered employees who have been working remotely to come back into the office or find another job in the midst of a new wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.”

Google

In June, CNBC reported that Google had updated its hybrid work policy, and it included the following:

“tracking office badge attendance, confronting workers who aren’t coming in when they’re supposed to and including the attendance in employees’ performance reviews.”

Publicis

The French multinational advertising and public relations company has told employees to return to the office, as reported by Adweek.

A memo and email obtained by Adweek state that all employees must establish time in the office three days a week, which includes travelling for business and meeting on client sites, and there will be consequences for those who don’t comply. The email is clear about the consequences.

“Failure to meet the 3 day/week in-office expectation post Labor Day may impact performance outcomes, including salary increases, bonus payouts and/or promotion opportunities.”

ANZ

ANZ is one of the big four banks in Australia. The Australian Financial Review reported:

“ANZ staff have been told their annual bonuses may be cut if they fail to spend at least 50 per cent of their scheduled working hours in the office.”

Origin Energy and Suncorp Group

Two of Australia’s largest businesses have linked office attendance to annual bonus payments.

Origin Energy and Suncorp Group employees risk having their bonus payments cut if they don’t comply with their company’s rules around working in the office.

Citi

The Times reported in September that Citi, a leading UK bank, had warned its UK-based employees that their bonuses could be docked if they failed to turn up at the office for least three days a week.

Tesla

Elon Musk told Tesla employees in 2022 that they must return to the office 40 hours a week or leave the company.

He said: “If you don’t show up, we will assume you have resigned. Anyone who wishes to do remote work must be in the office for a minimum (and I mean *minimum*) of 40 hours per week or depart Tesla.”

The backflips

Some companies initially agreed to let employees work from anywhere and then did a total backflip. Employees had made significant changes to their lifestyles on the promise that they could work from anywhere.

Meta

CNBC reported on the Meta backflip.

During the first year of the Covid-19 pandemic, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said the company learned that “good work can get done anywhere, and I’m even more optimistic that remote work at scale is possible, particularly as remote video presence and virtual reality continue to improve.”

In June 2020, Zuckerberg also said, “We’re going to be the most forward-leaning company on remote work at our scale”, according to The Verge.

Then, in June 2023, CEO Mark Zuckerberg made a sharp U-turn, telling employees they must be in the office at least three days a week.

The reason for the U-turn was in this memo.

“Our hypothesis is that it is still easier to build trust in person and that those relationships help us work more effectively.”

Nationwide

Nationwide, the UK’s biggest building society, told its 13,000 staff they would not be forced to return to the office when the Covid lockdowns ended. The then chief executive Joe Garner put in place a far-reaching flexible work policy called “work anywhere”, telling all staff who did not work the branches that it was “putting our employees in control of where they work from.”

His successor, Debbie Crosbie, overturned that policy, saying that most staff will be required to be in the office at least 40% of their contract - two days a week for a full-time employee.

As reported by the Guardian, “Many staff have completely changed their lives, some have moved houses, decided they could now expand their families or got pets, and so the news has been pretty upsetting,” said one staff member. “Many of us are also feeling the strain financially with the cost of living crisis and mortgages. It is a real blow.”

Dell

Dell Vice Chairman and Co-Chief Operating Officer Jeff Clarke told its employees to return to the office at least three days a week in May despite company Chairman Michael Dell’s complaint last September that chided CEOs for forcing employees to return to the office. At the time, Dell wrote, “If you are counting on forced hours spent in a traditional office to create collaboration and provide a feeling of belonging within your organization, you’re doing it wrong.”

Farmers Group

The Wall Street Journal reported:

“After the insurance industry company Farmers Group told employees last year that most of them would be remote workers, many made significant lifestyle changes in response to the policy. Some sold their cars, others expanded home offices or moved their families to new cities.

Then last month, Raul Vargas, who recently took over as chief executive, said he was reversing the approach. He would require the majority of Farmers employees to be in the office three days a week.”

Boeing

Boeing encouraged employees to stay at home during the pandemic and then offered a flexible work schedule in the years since COVID. In December, Stan Deal, executive vice president of the Boeing Co. and CEO of Boeing Commercial Airplanes, instructed his managers at the aerospace giant to have all employees return to the office five days a week, a return to pre-COVID norms.

The bullshit

So, let’s get to the BS.

These are reasons stated by the bullies, bribers, and BS artists for a return to the office.

Andy Jassy CEO Amazon:

“It’s easier to learn, model, practice, and strengthen our culture when we’re in the office together most of the time and surrounded by our colleagues.” 

Fiona Cicconi CPO Google:

“There's just no substitute for coming together in person."

Debbie Crosbie, CEO Nationwide:

The new policy retains the “positive aspects of working flexibly” while ensuring “we use our office space to share knowledge and skills, strengthen relationships and support one another”.

Arthur Sadoun, CEO Publicis:

“We have to admit that a disproportionate part of remote working is actually leading to siloed work, less collaboration, sometimes stunted creativity, fewer innovation and decreasing productivity.” 

Mark Zuckerberg CEO Meta:

“Our hypothesis is that it is still easier to build trust in person and that those relationships help us work more effectively.”

Jeff Clarke, VC and COO Dell:

“As a company, we are committed to preserving the special culture we have built over the last 39 years, creating a strong sense of belonging and accelerating the speed and ease of learning.”

Shayne Elliott, CEO ANZ:

“Don't think you are doing it for me. This is in your interest. This is how you learn. This is how you get better. This is how you build your skills. This is how you observe others."

David Solomon, CEO Goldman Sachs:

“For Goldman Sachs to retain that cultural foundation, we have to bring people together.”

Carly Kraft, Communications Manager, Farmers Insurance:

The mandate is meant to “foster greater collaboration, creativity and innovation while also providing better opportunities for learning, training, mentoring, career development and organic interaction.”

The behest

Common words are emerging in all this BS. The following all have three mentions.

·       Culture

·       Learning

·       Together

·       In-person

·       Collaboration

·       Skills

·       Creativity

·       Innovation

Everything I am about to say, I have said before! But I hope the science saying it takes the average person 2-7 times to hear the same message before they act is correct. If this newsletter is seen by an executive demanding a return to the office and dealing with an employee backlash, I hope they will take note and reach out for help and a sanity check.

Culture does not live in an office. Culture is a set of shared values and beliefs, behaviours and expectations. It has nothing to do with bricks and mortar.

Learning and skills development are not limited to an office. It depends on the context. If you are learning on the job, then it may be more effective to do that in person. If you are learning via computer-based training (CBT), it might make sense to do that with fewer distractions than in the office. If you are developing your communication skills, you must build your in-person skills and master the art of leading on Zoom, Teams, Slack and other online platforms.

Together and in-person are also contextual. I could go into a busy office surrounded by people and feel isolated. Togetherness does not occur by accident. It must be intentional. There are activities best done in person and best done alone. I will go into the office when being together and in person results in better outcomes, not just because it is a Wednesday.

Collaboration should take place where the outcomes will be optimised. It could be in person, virtual, or a blend of both. This should be a decision made by the team, not a mandate from the exec.

Creativity and innovation can happen anywhere, from in the shower to a beach in Hawaii to an office in downtown Sydney.  Do creative sparks fly when people are in person? Of course, they do because in-person interactions can stimulate creative tension. However, some employees are more productive and independently creative when working from home. Those situations are not governed by which day of the week or how many days you must be in an office.

According to McKinsey, virtual work is accelerating innovation, not holding it back.

“Although it may come as a surprise to some, boldly innovating through remote collaboration has been a fixture in the scientific community for decades. In the 1980s, researchers adopted a way of working called the “collaboratory,” a virtual space where scientists interact with colleagues, share data and instruments, and collaborate without regard to physical location. Breakthroughs achieved through virtual collaboration include the Human Genome Project and the ATLAS project at CERN, which involved 1,800 particle physicists across 34 countries.”

Let teams decide whether remote working, in-person experiences, or a combination of both will accelerate their speed of innovation.

The brief

A bad culture is not a remote issue; it is a leadership issue.

A lack of learning, development, collaboration, creativity, and innovation is not a remote issue; it is a leadership issue.