return-to-office

some-company-heads-hoped-return-to-office-mandates-would-make-people-quit,-survey-says

Some company heads hoped return-to-office mandates would make people quit, survey says

Policy, return-to-office, work from home / /

HR study —

1,504 workers, including 504 HR managers questioned.

–

Man and woman talking at an office water cooler

Enlarge / RTO mandates can boost workers’ professional networks, but in-office employees may also spend more time socializing than remote ones.

A new survey suggests that some US companies implemented return-to-office (RTO) policies in the hopes of getting workers to quit. And despite the belief that such policies could boost productivity compared to letting employees work from home, the survey from HR software provider BambooHR points to remote and in-office employees spending an equal amount of time working.

BambooHR surveyed 1,504 full-time US employees, including 504 human resources (HR) workers who are a manager or higher, from March 9 to March 22. According to the firm, the sample group used for its report “The New Surveillance Era: Visibility Beats Productivity for RTO & Remote” is equally split across genders and includes “a spread of age groups, race groups, and geographies.” Method Research, the research arm of technology PR and marketing firm Method, prepared the survey, and data collection firm Rep Data distributed it.

Trying to make people quit

Among those surveyed, 52 percent said they prefer working remotely compared to 39 percent who prefer working in an office.

A generation-based breakdown of respondents who prefer remote work. BambooHR's report didn't specify how many respondents it surveyed from each category.

Enlarge / A generation-based breakdown of respondents who prefer remote work. BambooHR’s report didn’t specify how many respondents it surveyed from each category.

Despite an apparently large interest in remote work, numerous companies made workers return to the office after COVID-19 pandemic restrictions were lifted. The report suggests that in at least some cases, this was done to get workers to quit:

Nearly two in five (37 percent) managers, directors, and executives believe their organization enacted layoffs in the last year because fewer employees than they expected quit during their RTO. And their beliefs are well-founded: One in four (25 percent) VP and C-suite executives and one in five (18 percent) HR pros admit they hoped for some voluntary turnover during an RTO.

It’s hard to get a firm understanding of the effectiveness of RTO policies, as 22 percent of HR professionals surveyed said that their company has no metrics for measuring a successful RTO. The report points to a “disconnect between stated goals for RTO and actually measuring the success of those goals.”

The report also found that 28 percent of remote workers fear they will be laid off before those working in the office. While BambooHR’s report doesn’t comment on this, some firms have discouraged employees from working remotely. Dell, for example, told remote workers that they can’t be promoted.

“By using RTO mandates as a workforce reduction tactic, companies are losing talent and morale among their employees,” BambooHR’s report says. The report notes that 45 percent of people surveyed whose companies have RTO policies said they lost valued workers. The finding is similar to that of a May study of Apple, Microsoft, and SpaceX that suggested that RTO mandates drove senior talent away.

In BambooHR’s survey, 28 percent said they would consider leaving their jobs if their employer enacted an RTO mandate.

Productivity

A frequently cited reason for in-office mandates is to drive teamwork, collaboration, and productivity. BambooHR’s data, however, doesn’t support the idea of RTO mandates driving productivity.

According to the report, regardless of whether they’re working in their home or in an office, employees work for 76 percent of a 9-to-5 shift. The report adds:

When it comes to who’s more productive overall, in-office workers spend around one hour more socializing than their remote counterparts, while remote workers spend that time on work-related tasks and responsibilities.

Despite this, 32 percent of managers said that one of the main goals of their firm implementing an in-office policy was to track employee working habits, with some companies tracking VPN usage and company badge swipes to ensure employees are coming into the office as expected.

RTO works for some

Although the majority of people surveyed prefer working from home, the survey also highlighted some perceived benefits of working in the office. For example, 48 percent of the people surveyed said “their work results have improved” since returning to the office, per the report. And 58 percent said they have a “stronger professional network” since going back, BambooHR reported.

Preferences for working from home or in an office can vary by various factors, like age. This points to the benefits of building RTO strategies around worker feedback and needs.

“The mental and emotional burdens workers face today are real, and the companies who seek employee feedback with the intent to listen and improve are the ones who will win employee loyalty and ultimately customer satisfaction,” Anita Grantham, head of HR at BambooHR, said in a statement.

Some company heads hoped return-to-office mandates would make people quit, survey says Read More »

apple,-spacex,-microsoft-return-to-office-mandates-drove-senior-talent-away

Apple, SpaceX, Microsoft return-to-office mandates drove senior talent away

Apple, Biz & IT, microsoft, return-to-office, spacex, work from home / /

The risk of RTO —

“It’s easier to manage a team that’s happy.”

–

Someone holding a box with their belonging in an office

A study analyzing Apple, Microsoft, and SpaceX suggests that return to office (RTO) mandates can lead to a higher rate of employees, especially senior-level ones, leaving the company, often to work at competitors.

The study (PDF), published this month by University of Chicago and University of Michigan researchers and reported by The Washington Post on Sunday, says:

In this paper, we provide causal evidence that RTO mandates at three large tech companies—Microsoft, SpaceX, and Apple—had a negative effect on the tenure and seniority of their respective workforce. In particular, we find the strongest negative effects at the top of the respective distributions, implying a more pronounced exodus of relatively senior personnel.

The study looked at résumé data from People Data Labs and used “260 million résumés matched to company data.” It only examined three companies, but the report’s authors noted that Apple, Microsoft, and SpaceX represent 30 percent of the tech industry’s revenue and over 2 percent of the technology industry’s workforce. The three companies have also been influential in setting RTO standards beyond their own companies. Robert Ployhart, a professor of business administration and management at the University of South Carolina and scholar at the Academy of Management, told the Post that despite the study being limited to three companies, its conclusions are a broader reflection of the effects of RTO policies in the US.

“Taken together, our findings imply that return to office mandates can imply significant human capital costs in terms of output, productivity, innovation, and competitiveness for the companies that implement them,” the report reads.

For example, after Apple enacted its RTO mandate, which lets employees work at home part-time, the portion of its employee base considered senior-level decreased by 5 percentage points, according to the paper. Microsoft, which also enacted a hybrid RTO approach, saw a decline of 5 percentage points. SpaceX’s RTO mandate, meanwhile, requires workers to be in an office full time. Its share of senior-level employees fell 15 percentage points after the mandate, the study found.

“We find experienced employees impacted by these policies at major tech companies seek work elsewhere, taking some of the most valuable human capital investments and tools of productivity with them,” one of the report’s authors, Austin Wright, an assistant professor of public policy at the University of Chicago, told the Post.

Christopher Myers, associate professor of management and organization health at Johns Hopkins University, suggested to the Post that the departure of senior-level workers could be tied to the hurt morale that comes from RTO mandates, noting that “it’s easier to manage a team that’s happy.”

Debated topic

Since the lifting of COVID-19 restrictions, whether having employees return to work in an office is necessary or beneficial to companies is up for debate. An estimated 75 percent of tech companies in the US are considered “fully flexible,” per a 2023 report from Scoop. As noted by the Post, however, the US’s biggest metro areas have, on average, 51 percent office occupancy, per data from managed security services firm Kastle Systems, which says it analyzes “keycard, fob and KastlePresence app access data across 2,600 buildings and 41,000 businesses.”

Microsoft declined to comment on the report from University of Chicago and University of Michigan researchers, while SpaceX didn’t respond. Apple representative Josh Rosenstock told The Washington Post that the report drew “inaccurate conclusions” and “does not reflect the realities of our business.” He claimed that “attrition is at historically low levels.”

Yet some companies have struggled to make employees who have spent months successfully doing their jobs at home eager to return to the office. Dell, Amazon, Google, Meta, and JPMorgan Chase have tracked employee badge swipes to ensure employees are coming into the office as often as expected. Dell also started tracking VPN usage this week and has told workers who work remotely full time that they can’t get a promotion.

Some company leaders are adamant that remote work can disrupt a company’s ability to innovate. However, there’s research suggesting that RTO mandates aren’t beneficial to companies. A survey of 18,000 Americans released in March pointed to flexible work schedules helping mental health. And an analysis of 457 S&P 500 companies in February found RTO policies hurt employee morale and don’t increase company value.

Apple, SpaceX, Microsoft return-to-office mandates drove senior talent away Read More »

dell-responds-to-return-to-office-resistance-with-vpn,-badge-tracking

Dell responds to return-to-office resistance with VPN, badge tracking

Biz & IT, dell, return-to-office, work from home / /

Office optics —

Report claims new tracking starts May 13 with unclear consequences.

–

Signage outside Dell Technologies headquarters in Round Rock, Texas, US, on Monday, Feb. 6, 2023.

After reversing its position on remote work, Dell is reportedly implementing new tracking techniques on May 13 to ensure its workers are following the company’s return-to-office (RTO) policy, The Register reported today, citing anonymous sources.

Dell has allowed people to work remotely for over 10 years. But in February, it issued an RTO mandate, and come May 13, most workers will be classified as either totally remote or hybrid. Starting this month, hybrid workers have to go into a Dell office at least 39 days per quarter. Fully remote workers, meanwhile, are ineligible for promotion, Business Insider reported in March.

Now The Register reports that Dell will track employees’ badge swipes and VPN connections to confirm that workers are in the office for a significant amount of time.

An unnamed source told the publication: “This is likely in response to the official numbers about how many of our staff members chose to remain remote after the RTO mandate.”

Dell’s methods for tracking hybrid workers will also reportedly include a color-coding system. The Register reported that Dell “plans to make weekly site visit data from its badge tracking available to employees through the corporation’s human capital management software and to give them color-coded ratings that summarize their status.” From “consistent” to “limited” presence, the colors are blue, green, yellow, and red.

A different person who reportedly works at Dell said that managers hadn’t shown consistency regarding how many red flags they would consider acceptable. The confusion led the source to tell The Register, “It’s a shit show here.”

An unnamed person reportedly “familiar with Dell” claimed that those failing to show up to a Dell office frequently enough will be referred to Dell COO Jeff Clarke.

Dell’s about-face

Ironically, Clarke used to support the idea of fully remote work post-pandemic. In 2020, he said:

After all of this investment to enable remote everything, we will never go back to the way things were before. Here at Dell, we expect, on an ongoing basis, that 60 percent of our workforce will stay remote or have a hybrid schedule where they work from home mostly and come into the office one or two days a week.”

It’s unclear exactly how many of Dell’s workers are remote. The Register reported today that approximately 50 percent of Dell’s US workers are remote, compared to 66 percent of international workers. In March, an anonymous source told Business Insider that 10–15 percent of every team at Dell was remote.

Michael Dell, Dell’s CEO and founder, also used to support remote work and penned a blog in 2022 saying that Dell “found no meaningful differences for team members working remotely or office-based even before the pandemic forced everyone home.”

Some suspect Dell’s suddenly stringent office policy is an attempt to force people to quit so that the company can avoid layoffs. In 2023, Dell laid off 13,000 people, per regulatory filings [PDF].

Dell didn’t respond to Ars’ request for comment. In a statement to The Register, a representative said that Dell believes “in-person connections paired with a flexible approach are critical to drive innovation and value differentiation.”

Questionable policies

News of Dell’s upcoming tracking methods comes amid growing concern about the potentially invasive and aggressive tactics companies have implemented as workers resist RTO policies. Meta, Amazon, Google, and JPMorgan Chase have all reportedly tracked in-office badge swipes. TikTok reportedly launched an app to track badge swipes and to ask workers why they weren’t in the office on days that they were expected to be.

However, the efficacy of RTO mandates is questionable. An examination of 457 companies on the S&P 500 list released in February concluded that RTO mandates don’t drive company value but instead negatively affect worker morale. Analysis of survey data from more than 18,000 working Americans released in March found that flexible workplace policies, including the ability to work remotely completely or part-time and flexible schedules, can help employees’ mental health.

Dell responds to return-to-office resistance with VPN, badge tracking Read More »

workers-with-job-flexibility-and-security-have-better-mental-health

Workers with job flexibility and security have better mental health

absenteeism, anxiety, health, job flexibility, job security, Mental Health, psychological distress, return-to-office, Science / /

Healthier work —

Job flexibility and security were linked to significantly less psychological distress and anxiety.

–

Workers with job flexibility and security have better mental health

Office Space

American workers who have more flexibility and security in their jobs also have better mental health, according to a study of 2021 survey data from over 18,000 nationally representative working Americans.

The study, published Monday in JAMA Network Open, may not be surprising to those who have faced return-to-office mandates and rounds of layoffs amid the pandemic. But, it offers clear data on just how important job flexibility and security are to the health and well-being of workers.

For the study, job flexibility was assessed in terms of ease of adjusting work schedules, advance notice of scheduling changes, and whether schedules were changed by employers often. People who reported greater flexibility in their job had 26 percent lower odds of serious psychological distress, which was measured on a validated, widely used questionnaire that assesses depression, nervousness, hopelessness, and worthlessness, among other forms of distress. Greater job flexibility was also linked to 13 percent lower odds of experiencing daily anxiety, 11 percent lower odds of experiencing weekly anxiety, and 9 percent lower odds of experiencing anxiety a few times a year.

Job security also appeared to be a boon for mental health. Workers were asked how likely they thought that they may lose their job or get laid off in the next 12 months. Those who reported feeling more secure in their positions had 25 percent lower odds of serious psychological distress. Job security was also associated with 27 percent lower odds of experiencing daily anxiety and 21 percent lower odds of experiencing weekly anxiety.

The study, led by Monica Wang of Boston University’s School of Public Health, also looked at how job flexibility and security affected job absenteeism, finding mixed results. Both job flexibility and security were linked to fewer days where workers reported working while they were sick—suggesting that flexibility and security enabled workers to make use of sick leave when they needed it. In line with that finding, more job flexibility led to more days where workers reported being absent due to illness in the three months prior to the survey. Greater job security, on the other hand, led to fewer absences over the previous three and 12 months.

It’s unclear why that would be the case, but the researchers speculated that “Job security may lead to lower work absenteeism due to higher work satisfaction, decreased job-related stress, and financial security,” they wrote.

Overall, the study’s findings indicate “the substantive impact that flexible and secure jobs can have on mental health in the short-term and long-term,” the researchers conclude.

They do note limitations of the study, the main one being that the study identifies associations and can’t determine that job flexibility and security directly caused mental health outcomes and the work absence findings. Still, they suggest that workplace policies could improve the mental health of employees. This includes flexible scheduling, leave policies, and working arrangements, including remote and hybrid options, which can all allow workers to accommodate personal and family needs. For improving job security, the researchers recommend longer-term contracts and long-term strategies to invest in employees, such as “uptraining,” skill development, and advancement opportunities.

Workers with job flexibility and security have better mental health Read More »

dell-tells-remote-workers-that-they-won’t-be-eligible-for-promotion

Dell tells remote workers that they won’t be eligible for promotion

Biz & IT, dell, Policy, remote work, return-to-office, work from home / /

Decisions, decisions —

Report highlights big turnaround from Dell’s previous pro-WFH stance.

–

A woman in a bright yellow jacket is sitting in front of a laptop in emotional tension.

Starting in May, Dell employees who are fully remote will not be eligible for promotion, Business Insider (BI) reported Saturday. The upcoming policy update represents a dramatic reversal from Dell’s prior stance on work from home (WFH), which included CEO Michael Dell saying: “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.”

Dell employees will mostly all be considered “remote” or “hybrid” starting in May, BI reported. Hybrid workers have to come into the office at least 39 days per quarter, Dell confirmed to Ars Technica, which equates to approximately three times a week. Those who would prefer to never commute to an office will not “be considered for promotion, or be able to change roles,” BI reported.

“For remote team members, it is important to understand the trade-offs: Career advancement, including applying to new roles in the company, will require a team member to reclassify as hybrid onsite,” Dell’s memo to workers said, per BI.

Dell didn’t respond to specific questions Ars Technica sent about the changes but sent a statement saying: “In today’s global technology revolution, we believe in-person connections paired with a flexible approach are critical to drive innovation and value differentiation.”

BI said it saw a promotion offer that a remote worker received that said that accepting the position would require coming into an “approved” office, which would mean that the employee would need to move out of their state.

Dell used to be pro-WFH

Dell’s history with remote workers started before the COVID-19 pandemic, over 10 years ago. Before 2020, 65 percent of Dell workers were already working remotely at least one day per week, per a blog that CEO Michael Dell penned via LinkedIn in September 2022. An anonymous Dell worker who reportedly has been remote for over 10 years and that BI spoke with estimated that 10 to 15 percent “of every team was remote” at Dell.

Michael Dell used to be a WFH advocate. In his 2022 blog post, he addressed the question of whether working in an office created “an advantage when it comes to promotion, performance, engagement or rewards,” determining:

At Dell, we found no meaningful differences for team members working remotely or office-based even before the pandemic forced everyone home. And when we asked our team members again this year, 90 percent of them said everyone has the opportunity to develop and learn new skills in our organization. The perception of unequal opportunity is just one of the myths of hybrid work …

At the time, Dell’s chief described the company as “committed to allow team members around the globe to choose the work style that best fits their lifestyle—whether that is remote or in an office or a blend of the two.” But the upcoming limitations for fully remote workers could be interpreted as Dell discouraging workers from working from home.

“We’re being forced into a position where either we’re going to be staying as the low man on the totem pole, first on the chopping block when it comes to workforce reduction, or we can be hybrid and go in multiple days a week, which really affects a lot of us,” an anonymous employee told BI.

Dell’s new WFH policy follows the February 2023 layoffs of about 6,650 workers, or around 5 percent of employees. Unnamed employees that BI spoke with showed concerns that the upcoming policy is an attempt to get people to quit so that Dell can save money on human resources without the severance costs of layoffs. Others are concerned that the rule changes will disproportionately affect women.

Meanwhile, the idea of return-to-office mandates helping businesses is being challenged. For example, a study by University of Pittsburgh researchers of some S&P 500 businesses found that return-to-office directives hurt employee morale and do not boost company finances.

Dell tells remote workers that they won’t be eligible for promotion Read More »

rto-doesn’t-improve-company-value,-but-does-make-employees-miserable:-study

RTO doesn’t improve company value, but does make employees miserable: Study

bosses, COVID-19, pandemic, return-to-office, S&P 500, Science, work from home, workers / /

WFH FTW —

Data is consistent with bosses using RTO to reassert control and scapegoat workers.

–

Empty cubicles

Enlarge / Empty cubicles

For some, having to work from home during the COVID-19 pandemic was stressful. Parents balanced job duties while caring for children. Some struggled to set up a home office and adjust to new tools, like video conferencing. Lonely workdays at home added to social isolation. The line between work and life blurred.

For others, working from home was a boon—comfort, convenience, flexibility, no commuting or rush-hour traffic, no office-environment distractions. When the acute aspects of the pandemic receded, some who at first struggled began to settle into a work-from-home (WFH) groove and appreciated the newfound flexibility.

Then, bosses began calling their employees back to the office. Many made the argument that the return-to-office (RTO) policies and mandates were better for their companies; workers are more productive at the office, and face-to-face interactions promote collaboration, many suggested. But there’s little data to support that argument. Pandemic-era productivity is tricky to interpret, given that the crisis disrupted every aspect of life. Research from before the pandemic generally suggested remote work improves worker performance—though it often included workers who volunteered to WFH, potentially biasing the finding.

For a clearer look at the effect of RTO policies after the pandemic, two business researchers at the University of Pittsburgh examined a sample of firms on the S&P 500 list—137 of which had RTO mandates and 320 that clearly did not between June 2019 and January 2023. The researchers collected publicly available data on each company, including financial data and employee reviews. They then looked at what factors were linked to whether a firm implemented an RTO policy—such as the company’s size, financial constraints, and CEO characteristics—as well as the consequences of the RTO mandates—employee satisfaction and financial metrics of the firms.

Overall, the analysis, released as a pre-print, found that RTO mandates did not improve a firm’s financial metrics, but they did decrease employee satisfaction.

Drilling down, the data indicated that RTO mandates were linked to firms with male CEOs who had greater power in the company. Here, power is measured as the CEO’s total compensation divided by the average total compensation paid to the four highest-paid executives in the firm.

Before the analysis, the researchers hypothesized that RTO mandates may be used to blame employees for poor firm performance. But, companies that have institutional ownership—such as hedge funds or endowments—would not fall for such a “blame game” and would thus would be less likely to implement an RTO mandate. The data supported those hypotheses. Firms with weaker stock performance before employees were able to return to the office were more likely to enforce RTO mandates. However, institutional ownership decreased the probability of RTO mandates.

Although CEOs often justified RTO mandates by arguing it will improve the company’s performance, “Results of our determinant analyses are consistent with managers using RTO mandates to reassert control over employees and blame employees as a scapegoat for bad firm performance,” the researchers concluded.

Unsurprisingly, the researchers also found that RTO mandates were linked to decreases in employee satisfaction. Specifically, after an RTO mandate, employees’ ratings significantly declined on overall job satisfaction, work-life balance, senior management, and corporate culture. But their ratings of factors unrelated to RTO did not change, indicating that the RTO mandate was driving dissatisfaction.

The study has limitations, including a short time frame to look at long-term outcomes of RTO policies and a time frame that overlapped with a labor shortage. Worker responses may be different in a tight labor market. Still, the study adds some data to the ongoing debate—and feuds—over RTO policies.

RTO doesn’t improve company value, but does make employees miserable: Study Read More »