5-day office mandate is not a ‘backdoor firing’

Amazon CEO Andy Jassy dismissed speculation that the company’s five-day mandate at the office was given to further reduce staff or appease city officials.

“A number of people I’ve seen theorize that the reason we did this was a backdoor firing or we made some kind of deal with the city or cities and that’s why we got people to come back and be together more often,” Jassy said at an all-hands meeting Tuesday, according to remarks obtained by CNBC. “I can tell you that both of these are not true.”

Amazon announced the new mandate in September. The company’s previous return to work required company employees to be in the office at least three days a week. Employees have until January 2 to comply with the new policy.

The mandate has spurred pushback from some Amazon employees who say they are just as productive working from home or in a hybrid work environment as they are in the office. Others have said the mandate is consistent with Jassy’s continued cost-cutting efforts, suggesting it is a means of forced attrition. Amazon has laid off more than 27,000 employees since the beginning of 2022.

An Amazon spokesperson pointed to Jassy’s memo announcing the 5-day term in office.

The company provides a variety of benefits and services for employee commuting that vary by location but include free shuttles, subsidized parking, reimbursable public transportation, subsidized carpooling and bike-related costs, an Amazon spokesperson told CNBC.

Jassy’s Tuesday comments were previously reported by Reuters.

“This was not a cost game for us,” Jassy said at the meeting that coincided with Election Day. “This is very much about our culture and strengthening our culture.”

At the time he announced the mandate, Jassy said a full-time return to the office would allow Amazon to be “better set up to invent, collaborate and be connected enough to each other and our culture to deliver the absolute best for customers and business.”

Amazon’s cloud chief Matt Garman also defended the decision last month, saying employees who don’t agree with the company’s new policy can leave, CNBC previously reported. Garman also said he has talked to employees about the mandate and “nine out of 10 people are actually pretty excited about this change.”

Garman’s comments further rankled Amazon’s employees.

About 500 employees who work for Amazon’s cloud computing business, Amazon Web Services, wrote a letter to Garman last week criticizing his remarks and questioning the merits of a five-day mandate at the office, according to a copy of the letter seen by CNBC.

“We urge you to reconsider your comments and position on the proposed 5-day mandate,” the letter states. “Remote and flexible work is an opportunity for Amazon to take the lead, not a threat. We want to work for a company and for leaders who recognize and seize this moment to challenge us to reinvent how we work.”

The letter included anecdotes from AWS employees who described how the five-day mandate at the office will affect their “lives and work.” One employee said they were denied a disability accommodation and told to return to the office, and another employee said they were recently told to use paid time off to care for a sick family member instead of getting allowed to work from home. Another employee said the RTO mandate would require them to be in an office “over 200 miles from my home.”

At least 37,000 employees have joined an internal Slack channel created last year to advocate for telecommuting and share complaints about the return-to-work mandate, CNBC previously reported. Employees have previously pushed back on the 3-day mandate at the office, with some staging a walkout at Amazon’s headquarters in Seattle to express their displeasure.

Jassy acknowledged on Tuesday that the five-day mandate at the office will be an adjustment for the employees.

“I understand that for a lot of people and we will work through that adjustment together,” he said.

CLOCK: AWS CEO says employees unhappy with 5-day office mandate can leave