Earlier this month, Tim Cook announced in an internal memo that Apple is going to adopt a new hybrid work plan that will require employees to work in-person at least three days a week. While this has resulted in some controversy, the company reaffirmed that it has no plans to go back on its decision, as it considers in-person work “essential.”
In an internal video obtained by The Verge, senior VP of retail and people Deirdre O’Brien said that Apple believes that “in-person collaboration is essential to our culture and our future.” O’Brien also mentioned that the products and services introduced by Apple in the past have all been the result of in-person collaboration.
“If we take a moment to reflect on our unbelievable product launches this past year, the products and the launch execution were built upon the base of years of work that we did when we were all together in-person.”
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Apple had to close its offices in 2020, which resulted in more than a year of completely remote work. Now that the situation is better in the US, the company wants its employees to return to in-person work, but there’s a group of people who have taken a stand against this decision.
Employees have sent a letter to Apple CEO Tim Cook asking the company to let them choose to work in-person or remote, but Apple is denying this request. As mentioned by the report, the company will consider each case individually, but the order now is to return to the office on the hybrid model.
Now, Apple is essentially denying that request, saying any remote work decisions will be made “on a case-by-case basis with any new remote positions requiring executive approval.”
Although a hybrid working model is part of a new, more relaxed approach from Apple, it’s still quite traditional when compared to other companies like Google and Facebook, which let their employees work remotely indefinitely.
FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.
Check out 9to5Mac on YouTube for more Apple news:
rcjlfk on June 30th, 2021 at 04:04 UTC »
The amount that people care about Apple's hybrid work policies is absurd. They're not ridiculous. If you were hired to work at Apple, you'll probably find another job pretty easily if you want to be remote instead.
Edit: Adding this to my initial comment for visibility because it seems to be coming up a lot Many of the replies are two conflicting ideas.
1) Apple is dumb and they're going to lose talent to remote work opportunities. 2) Apple is a standard-bearer and other companies across the nation will follow their lead.
They can't both be right. If they were the standard-bearer, there wouldn't be remote opportunities to lose talent to because companies are allegedly following Apple, and more generally, GAFA's lead. If the labor market demands remote work, and people are refusing to live in the Bay Area, then it will force Apple to shift because they'll have jobs go unfilled.
calvinball-z on June 30th, 2021 at 02:59 UTC »
Working from home has been great, but there are definitely a lot of things that benefit from in-person collaboration, and three days in-office per week seems like a pretty reasonable compromise.
stephenweewoo on June 30th, 2021 at 02:38 UTC »
They just spent billions on that facility, they definitely want people to work in it.