Return-to-office policies continue to face backlash, with PwC becoming yet another company that must resort to thorough employee tracking to enforce their new policy.
In 2024, remote jobs continue to dwindle, with more and more business owners insisting on an in-office workforce, despite productivity statistics showing how unnecessary it all is.
Even worse, many companies are going to extreme lengths to make sure employees are complying, and there’s a good chance it has a negative impact on employee satisfaction.
PwC Sends Memo to Employees About RTO
According to an internal employee memo acquired by the Financial Times, PwC has informed its 26,000 UK-based employees that they need to be in the office three days per week, starting in January 2025.
More notably, PwC added that it would be monitoring the location data of all employees as a part of enforcing this new policy. The company also noted that it was doing so in service of more “fairly and consistently” applying the new policy for employees.
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“We all benefit from the positive impact of a hybrid approach, but the previous guidance of at least two to three days a week was open to interpretation.” – Laura Hinton, managing partner at PwC
RTO Backlash Continues to Rage
PwC certainly isn’t the only company that is trying its best to get employees back in the office. In fact, we’ve been tracking every company that gets rid of remote work over the last few years, and the list is nothing if not extensive, including companies like Amazon, Disney, and General Motors.
Unfortunately for businesses that are doing so, the employees are not taking kindly to the change. In fact, at companies like Amazon, employees have organized in a pretty substantial way, demanding that the company embrace the flexible working accommodations that became popular during the pandemic.
Beyond that, the general consensus from employees in regard to returning to the office has been quite negative. Some studies found that 42.6% of employees would rather quit than give up their remote work privileges.
Is Working From Home Less Productive?
Given all the news about return-to-office policies hitting big tech firms, it’s safe to wonder whether remote work is actually making people less productive. After all, these CEOs and business owners must have some data to back up their decision to force employees back into the office against their will, right?
Wrong! In fact, some execs have even admitted that they have “no data” to back up their return-to-office policies, with the majority of statistics showing that employees are more productive, have better mental health, and even increase revenue at businesses when allowed to work from home.
All that to say, return-to-office policies continue to be a thorn in the side of big businesses, and we don’t expect that to slow down any time soon. So, if you’re a business considering forcing your employees back into the office, maybe don’t.
