Elon Musk\u2019s demand that Tesla Inc staff stop \u201cphoning it in\u201d and get back to the office has thrust the world\u2019s richest person into the noisy debate over the future of work, and shows again that some CEOs remain tone-deaf to employees\u2019 growing demands for flexibility.<\/p>\n
\u201cEveryone at Tesla is required to spend a minimum of 40 hours in the office per week,\u201d Musk wrote in a message addressed to employees at the electric-car maker. That \u201cmust be where your actual colleagues are located, not some remote pseudo office. If you don\u2019t show up, we will assume you have resigned. The more senior you are, the more visible must be your presence.\u201d<\/p>\n
But that mandate might not be acceptable to some at Tesla, and will certainly spook staffers at Twitter Inc, which Musk is seeking to acquire, who have enjoyed a work-from-anywhere policy throughout the pandemic. In today\u2019s tight labor market, with salaries soaring and workers quitting at a record clip, Musk\u2019s policy could also cost him some talent.<\/p>\n
\u201cCompanies that demand that their employees come back to the office are likely to face a set of problems,\u201d said Brian Kropp, head of human resources research at Gartner Inc, a technology consulting company. \u201cThey will either have access to a smaller talent pool or will have to pay a compensation premium to force employees to come back.\u201d<\/p>\n
More than two out of three so-called knowledge workers – data scientists, engineers, graphic designers – prefer hybrid work, according to an ongoing survey of more than 10,000 white-collar workers from Future Forum. The research consortium is backed by Slack Technologies, a unit of Salesforce Inc. that offers a popular workplace communications service.<\/p>\n
Empty offices<\/strong><\/p>\n Just 19% of executives are working from the office five days a week, compared with 35% of non-execs, Future Forum found. Those who are in the office full time report higher levels of stress and anxiety, and more than half would prefer to work flexibly at least part of the time.<\/p>\n Tesla\u2019s chief executive officer isn\u2019t having that. In his return-to-office memo, Musk said Tesla would have \u201clong ago gone bankrupt\u201d if he hadn\u2019t \u201clived in the factory so much — so that those on the line could see me working alongside them.\u201d<\/p>\n He also ridiculed companies with more flexible workplace policies, saying \u201cwhen was the last time they shipped a great product? It\u2019s been a while.\u201d<\/p>\n Carmakers, along with retailers and other firms with a mix of white-collar and frontline workers, walk a fine line when they extend flexibility to some employees and not to others.<\/p>\n The pandemic laid bare how dependent society is on the physical presence of blue-collar workers in hospitals, meatpacking plants and grocery stores. The idea of white-collar employees logging in safely at home, while lower-paid employees risked their health to show up in person, has been an added source of resentment in an already stratified US economy.<\/p>\n Going it alone<\/strong><\/p>\n Musk\u2019s office mandate contrasts with some auto-industry rivals. Ford Motor Co in April adopted a \u201cflexible hybrid\u201d model where some salaried staffers mainly come in for collaborative work and otherwise work from home.<\/p>\n General Motors Co has a \u201cwork appropriately\u201d strategy that lets white-collar workers log in remotely, rather than coming in every day. Mitsubishi Motors North America Inc offers its corporate employees the option to work from home all the time.<\/p>\n Musk\u2019s dismissal of remote work, which he dismissed as \u201cpretend,\u201d illustrates a commonly held perception among bosses that remote workers aren\u2019t as productive, innovative or collaborative as those in the office.<\/p>\n Goldman Sachs Group Inc CEO David Solomon last year called remote work an \u201caberration,\u201d while Morgan Stanley CEO James Gorman expressed frustration that New Yorkers were visiting the city\u2019s restaurants but avoiding their offices.<\/p>\n Research from Nicholas Bloom at Stanford University and other academics has shown that remote workers are just as productive, and typically more satisfied, than office workers.<\/p>\n Twitter\u2019s Take<\/strong><\/p>\n Musk\u2019s ultimatum also runs counter to current policy at Twitter, which is one of the most prominent tech companies to let most employees work from home permanently.<\/p>\n \u201cIf our employees are in a role and situation that enables them to work from home and they want to continue to do so forever, we will make that happen,\u201d Twitter said last year.<\/p>\n Half of the world\u2019s workers do so remotely or in a hybrid setup, up from 9% prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, according to a global study of employers by Willis Towers Watson, a risk-management and human-resources firm.<\/p>\n \u201cThe widespread adoption of these work arrangements during the pandemic has challenged some of myths that have accompanied remote work over the years, namely that people cannot be productive working remotely, which has fed into greater openness and acceptance,\u201d said Brad Bell, director of the Center for Advanced Human Resource Studies at Cornell University. At Tesla, though, \u201cclearly that is not true.\u201d<\/p>\n
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