has anyone seen any recent formal communication regarding enforcing the 4-day in office requirements at HQ for everyone? Can some teams still do the 2-day a week on average for the quarter and still be in compliance? With all of the re-orgs anticipated I'm wondering how this could affect people moving from a more flexible env to a rigid one or vice versa.
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@1rk s@ck it up buttercup. Were you hired as a remote worker? No? Then you’re the lazy @ss d0mmy. lol get over it cry baby.
@rv it's pretty weird to see people defending the dum--ss 4 day in office requirement like it makes sense. It comes from the same brain-damaged set of managers who are going to be responsible for laying you all off! It's another indication that the top layers of the company haven't got a fu--ing clue what they're doing. Every quarter the stock price drops and so they knee-je-k and take it out on all the staff as if they're not working hard enough. If you really believe the problem is laziness or lack of "productivity" then you're as much of a mo--n as them.
@rw you can certainly meet the 4 days per week quota by working in the office 5 days a week for the rest of the month. /s
@az one week off per month attending 4 days/week for the other remaining weeks generally gets your to an average of 3 for the month. It’s math.
@ay the rule has always been 4 days per week. The reason they enforce at 2.5 via an HR report is to take into account vacations and time off. Your manager should have been holding you accountable for 4 days per week all this time. And if you take two weeks vacation, your manager would also be accountable for sending an exception to HR. It’s not hard. So if you have been getting away with 2.5 on a regular basis then congratulations - you have managed to deceive the system and are probably part of the reason they are now looking to treat us like children and put obnoxious enforcement in place.
@jk they do not take PTO into account. Sounds like in some depts they might, but I know for the most HQ orgs, they do not. You can’t take proper vacations without being on the HR reports. This summer was the worst, I took one vaca and it messed up my month regardless of my PTO days so I had to make sure I had to make up those days ruining the rest of my summer even though I have plenty of PTO time but no real way to take it.
@e7 they do take PTO into account what are you even talking about
My issue with the 4 days a week (regardless of whether its 2.5 or 3 days you have to be over to be eligible for a promotion or an exceeds expectations in your review) is that it doesnt take PTO into account. If 2 employees - one who started 2 years ago and one who started 12 years ago - both work the same number of days from home, and both use all their PTO (with the tenured person having twice as much vacation time than the other person), the tenured person will have a different in office average than the less tenured person. The calculation is wrong. If the company doesnt expect you to be in the office on company holidays, it shouldnt be counting your PTO as an eligible in office day.
Also, they are making this retroactive. People made decisions the last 3 quarters based on the 4 days a week but eligibikity being over 2.5 days. Now someone could be scrambling to raise their average based on a policy that was changed at the last minute.
It doesnt matter that cuts are happening, this is a toxic work policy and for those still here, it shows how the company feels about its employees and their work life balance. You also dont know how this list will be used, so you could be a person who always comes in but had a rough last quarter (death in the family, using lot of PTO, etc) and now fall on the list. Saying everything averages out in the end is ridiculous.
@OP you are not going to get sympathetic responses here. Those who were the most vocal against RTO mandates already left the company long ago. Those harping on you as if they are enforcers of HR policies are just strangers who are also fearful for their own survival in this environment. Whether someone willingly "signed up for this" is not the point. Ten years ago that someone might not have young children at home with after-school activities, and the commute into Center City has gotten much worse now compared to 2019, the last year before COVID, with far fewer trains that also have less capacity. By simply watching the patterns of foot traffic going through Suburban Station at different hours of the day, one can tell the RTO mandate has been a performative farce. Do what is right for your family, at the end of the day that's what really matters. While there are fewer fully remote jobs now than there were right after COVID, they do exist. You may need to make compromises in other aspects, but life is full of compromises. Good luck!
@a9 This is trash. they might say 4 days but how can anyone get 4 days RTO with PTO
@a9 what a trash response. The “rule” was 4, but the enforcement was 2.5 which means the rule was 2.5. Enforcing it at 4 means there’s a change.
4 days is the requirement, if you've been getting away with 1-3 days on average that's on you. You can't complain if they decide to enforce an existing policy that you agreed to.
@OP John G sent out an email clarifying that it’s been 4 days all along. Everyone knew that. They’ve just haven’t been abiding by it. From Leadership, lack of in office adherence will now play a role in your year end performance review. Meaning you could be penalized for not being in office 4 days, or even put on a PIP.
Listen, the mandate has been four days a week. People keep saying “now they’re going to require four days” like that’s a new policy. It isn’t. If you’ve been coming in less because the attendance tracking allowed some wiggle room, that doesn’t mean the requirement changed. People are confusing what gets flagged with what’s required. Even if the tracking has effectively allowed a lower quarterly average, that isn’t permission to come in two days a week indefinitely. That said, nobody has shared an official communication confirming this rumored change in enforcement. We’re stressing over something that hasn’t been confirmed. If stricter enforcement does come, it would mean enforcing the existing policy. If four days genuinely doesn’t work for you, now is the time to explore an approved arrangement or another role, because the policy already says four.
I'm trying to prepare myself for all possibilities including potential internal opportunities but the 4-day mandatory enforcement would likely impact my decision. My current commute is close to 2-hours each way, I wouldn't want to do that 4-days a week with little to no flexibility. I'm just asking if anyone has seen any recent formal communication and/or rules about the in office requirements.
@OP really?? You’re worried about 4 days mandatory in office in a time where the company is about to do massive layoffs, one that is predicted to be larger than last year? Well you don’t have to worry about that if you’re laid off. Good luck.
While I understand where you are coming from - my commute was over three hours round trip - with everything that is happening you should be prepared to go in four days a week, or look at other opportunities (which I would do regardless had I not been let go in one of the earlier rounds).