Laura was working from house when her husband forwarded her a hyperlink to the information: Amazon tells workers to return to workplace 5 days every week. It was the primary time the working mother, who has been with Amazon for over 4 years, realized she would want so as to add one other 4 hours to her weekly commute.
“At first, I didn’t quite believe it,” she tells Fortune. “After all, who expects to get career-altering news from a news article instead of your employer.”
“Which, to be honest, is a pretty horrible way to find out about something that’s going to impact your life in a huge way. I really, really would have liked a personal communication from my manager, but that didn’t happen for a couple of days.”
Laura says she was employed nearly through the pandemic with the understanding that there was no expectation to return to Amazon’s workplaces.
That was, till 2023 when CEO Andy Jassy introduced that he wished staff to “go back to being in the office together the majority of the time”—at the very least, three days per week.
“The original RTO mandate was a tough pill to swallow, but the latest one is impossible,” she says.
After the preliminary shock of the information blew over, Laura says a way of calm and clairty washed over: “My months of struggling to make three days a week are over, and I know that my time at Amazon has to end.”
Even when she might decide to commuting into the workplace full time, Laura says she would nonetheless give up over Amazon’s distant work bait and swap.
“Honestly, I’ve lost so much trust in Amazon leadership at this point,” she provides. “I’ve been updating my resume and portfolio, and rage applying to new jobs on LinkedIn.”
Laura’s not alone: A handful of Amazon workers advised Fortune that they’re so pissed off with the tech big’s struggle on working from house that they’re formally on the job hunt.
Two say the realized the information—and its implications—by way of the media, quite than a manger.
One says they’ve already handed their discover in. One other says they’ve had two interview gives inside 48 hours of the RTO announcement.
Amazon didn’t reply to Fortune’s request for remark.
Is the 5-day mandate a “negotiation game”?
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy has repeatedly warned distant staff that it’s “not going to work out” for them on the firm.
Regardless of this, it’s clear that a variety of Amazon workers (and managers, for that matter) have been ignoring the rules up till now.
Specialists beforehand advised Fortune that Amazon’s 5-day mandate is a “negotiation game” to get workers within the workplace for the three days it initially requested for.
“I was not complying,” Ben, who lives three hours away from an Amazon workplace, feedback on the earlier hybrid coverage.
He briefly thought-about transferring earlier than pondering once more: “I decided not to make life choices as Amazon can fire me at will anyway, and I do not want to make long-term life changes because some manager decided I should start going to the office when I was hired virtual and promised I could work from wherever I want.”
Some managers have been nonetheless assuring their new hires might work at home after the 3-day mandate got here into impact.
One worker advised Fortune that he was employed remotely in Could 2023—a month after the corporate introduced its preliminary RTO coverage.
“I left a decent company I live near to go to Amazon since it was working from home,” Luca, a millennial analyst, complains. “For me, it’s not that I don’t want to go in the office, there is no office close to me.”
He says that his supervisor has been protecting for his absence from any workplace, however that can not work.
“He told me he would not be able to help, they’ve made him go into an office too,” Luca says, including that he couldn’t get a agency reply on whether or not he can be anticipated to move into the workplace regardless of being promised in any other case within the interview room.
“I like my job at Amazon, but I need firm ground to stand on and they are not providing that.”
Whether or not Jassy’s newest transfer is to make workers present their faces extra often or not, staff have till Jan. 2, 2025 (the date he’s given them to relocate if wanted) to name his bluff—or give up.
Most people Fortune spoke to suppose that Amazon is secretly hoping for the latter anyway.
A thinly veiled headcount discount
Whereas Jassy positioned Amazon’s modifications—which additionally embody a flattened hierarchy and no extra sizzling desking—as a greater technique to work, disgruntled workers are adamant that it’s a thinly veiled headcount discount.
“It’s a rob Peter to pay Paul situation of short-term gains from voluntary layoffs in exchange for losing top talent and reducing productivity for years to come,” Gen X program supervisor Jared says.
Though he’s solely been working at Amazon for six months, he’s already modified his LinkedIn standing to #opentowork, reached out to former colleagues, and up to date his resume within the hopes of discovering a extra versatile job earlier than Jan. 2.
“The new policy is less flexible than pre-COVID and does not respect the needs of employees to take care of their health, their family, or work-life balance,” Jared scoffs. “I will not go back.”
Whereas he was complying with the three-day coverage, he refused to return to working in a cubicle 5 days every week when Amazon’s opponents are nonetheless providing some working from house—and he thinks many others will do the identical.
“As a top performer with prior MAANG (Meta, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, and Google) experience in this tight market, I believe it will be fairly easy to find a new role that is at least hybrid,” Jared provides.
“One of my co-workers put in his notice on Monday. I expect others to follow.”
He’s not flawed. Rumors of a stricter RTO have been sufficient ammunition to encourage Ben to give up—he took “voluntary termination” two months in the past and has now began his personal agency.
Likewise, Lisa, a advertising chief in Europe, has known as time on her 4 years at Amazon. After listening to about Jassy’s announcement by way of the information, the 40-something says she instantly began reaching out to recruiters.
“This new mandate goes against so many of the leadership principles that we supposedly hold so dear,” she says, including that she has been a “top-rated employee year on year” due to working from house.
“I’ve constantly delivered for this business and their reward is to order me back into the office, where I will sit at my desk either writing docs or sitting on calls,” Lisa provides. “I don’t want to work for a business that clearly has so little respect for me.”
Each job that Lisa has utilized for gives hybrid work, and he or she’s assured she’ll discover a extra versatile employer earlier than the New Yr.
Inside 48 hours of Amazon’s new coverage going public, she had already secured two job interviews.
“I will always work hard, but now I want to work for a company that works hard for me too.”
Interviewee names have been modified for anonymity.
