The coming weeks will see a mandate from on high for JPMorgan employees that they need to be back in the office full time.
The US’s biggest bank is planning to announce the new mandate that will see an expansion of existing rules. It currently has around 60% of its workforce in the office five days a week.
As one of Wall Street’s biggest names, the move is sure to have an impact on other financial outfits, but also could prompt workers to look elsewhere for jobs that offer a less draconian policy towards flexible working.
JP Morgan Issues Back to Office Mandate
JPMorgan’s CEO, Jamie Dimon, has consistently voiced criticism of flexible working policies. He was particularly critical of federal workers not being in the office full time. Speaking at The Atlantic Festival in September, Dimon said he’d “make Washington, D.C. go back to work. He added: “I can’t believe, when I come down here, the empty buildings. The people who work for you not going to the office. That bothers me. I don’t allow that at JP[Morgan].”
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This was a sign of things to come. However, the mandate has not been officially announced as yet and the company’s spokespeople are not commenting. It has, however, been widely reported with Bloomberg breaking the story.
Could There Be Resistance to RTO Order?
Aggressive RTO mandates have been constantly in the news since the end of the pandemic. The world’s largest tech companies have pushed ahead with strict policies but there has been some resistance.
Amazon employees were told that they needed to be back in the office full time from this month, but then had to revert to a more staggered return when it transpired that there wasn’t enough office space for all of the employees. The company’s insistence that it was necessary for its ethos and productivity was met with disdain by employees – some of which mobilized to fight the mandate.
Dell and AT&T have also put strict RTO mandates in place, which has led to accusations that these policies are a sneaky way of “thinning the herd” – something a leaked internal memo from Dell actually confirmed. At Dell, employees have already seen swathes of layoffs so morale is understandably low.
Sweetening the Blow
Bloomberg suggests that JPMorgan is hoping to wow employees with a new building in midtown Manhattan and is offering “enticements including yoga and cycling rooms, meditation spaces, outdoor areas and a state-of-the-art food hall”.
However, for many, the cost of a five-day commute and stringent rules about attendance could be enough to drive them elsewhere. Even with reports suggesting that five days in the office can still offer some flexibility, some employees will simply feel their needs are being shoved aside despite no actual evidence that WFH isn’t efficient.
