S’pore Grab Employees Must Work from Office from 2 Dec

By
Champa Ha
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IBM, Amazon, and now Grab. 

These are three examples of tech companies that have lauded their hybrid work arrangements for their employees as one of their biggest strengths, but have since reversed their position to request their employees return to the office to work on-site. 

This was announced during a town hall meeting on Thursday, 24 October, with many employees confirming that the mandate to return to work five days a week will start on 2 December. 

The rationale behind the move? To increase face-to-face collaboration that will speed up progress and “enhance integration across our ecosystem and business units”.  

Or, in layman’s terms: increase opportunities for your team members to let you down during project work at the same location. 

Chief Executive Officer Anthony Tan has justified the move to bring employees back to the office for five days a week as a way to drive faster growth for the tech-firm in a recent email. 

Employees who may have become too used to the three-day on-site work, and two-day work from home (WFH) schedule will have a one-month “adjustment period” before the 2 Dec mandate. 

This is so that employees can take time to make other arrangements for any personal and caregiving responsibilities.

The Return to Work Mandate 

As mentioned earlier, Grab is not the only tech firm that has pushed their employees to return back to the office. 

Amazon, for example, has recently sent out a mandate for all their employees to return back to the office five days a week earlier in October. 

Much like how you may look at your parents when they give you a plate of veggies instead of meat at dinner, this has been met with much controversy and unhappiness amongst employees. 

However, much like how your parents would tell you to go suck eggs if you protested, management at Amazon have said that employees who disagree with the decision can choose to quit. 

“If there are people who just don’t work well in that environment and don’t want to, that’s okay, there are other companies around,” said Unit Chief Executive Officer Matt Garman, speaking at an all-hands meeting at Amazon Web Services. 

“When we want to really, really innovate on interesting products, I have not seen an ability for us to do that when we’re not in-person.” 

Another company that has issued a mandate for employees to return to the office? Zoom.

The firm, which has specialised in helping employees video-conference from multiple areas, including home, has pushed their employees back into the office as well.

It’s ironic, given that people use Zoom for many WFH tasks.

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Champa Ha