Amazon’s RTO Push could be the start of a bigger push from employers

But first, it was fun while it lasted.

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The big story

Return of RTO

Remote workers, beware: your work-from-home days are numbered.

This revelation comes after Amazon announced it wants the employees back in the office for five days a week starting in January. The tech giant’s office requirements will return to “the way we were before COVID,” according to a notice from CEO Andy Jassy.

We also got our hands on the outline of the 22 question document frequently asked questions about the new mandate — together with a Leaked FAQ outlining the company’s plans to meet its new goal of having fewer managers

Some Amazon employees was quick to criticize the RTO plan in internal Slack messages viewed by Business Insider. One employee wrote on Slack: “This is not ‘going back’ to the way things were. It’s just a return.”

Amazon has been fighting to get its workers back to the office for nearly two years. In February 2023, it announced plans to require most office workers to report in person three days a week.

The initial mandate didn’t go down well with employees, but Amazon stuck to its guns. He threatened to fire workers who did not comply and took severe action against employees who stopped briefly in the office just to fulfill their mandate.

Amazon’s announcement could be the nail in the coffin of hybrid work.

Fully remote jobs are rare, but many employers still offer some flexibility in the office. (Wall Street is an exception, as firms have mostly called their employees back to the office full-time.)

But Amazon’s decision will encourage any employer looking to bring their people back to their offices for good. It’s a lot easier to make the case for office work when one of the world’s biggest companies subscribes to it.

And in the hyper-competitive world of Big Tech, other tech giants might follow suit rather than risk being bad-mouthed by rivals to their customers. How can a Big Tech company really serve you best when its people are at home half the time?

That doesn’t mean it will go well. Experts warned that the cost of calling workers back to their cubicles five days a week could also be high enough in terms of morale and retention. bosses should tread carefully. Employees will also point to lost commuting time and say their productivity hasn’t decreased when working from home.

Meanwhile, employers will use words like “culture” and “collaboration” as reasons to bring everyone to the office. (Jassy used them 12 and five times respectively, in his new memoir.) And they probably aren’t excited about things like “quiet vacations” or “quiet hybrid” happening right under their noses.

The reality is that both sides are right. A survey by McKinsey found that companies with employees who stayed in the same place – whether at the office or at home – reported less revenue growth than those with a hybrid setup.

News summary

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The Insider Today team: Dan DeFrancesco, deputy editor and anchor, in New York. Hallam Bullock, Editor-in-Chief, London. Milan Sehmbi, colleague, in London. Amanda Yen, colleague, in New York.