“Remote work is not compatible with a high ambition level plus high speed,” Nothing CEO said in a letter, ordering all employees to work from the office five days a week.
Carl Pei, CEO and founder of the London-based company, believes the decision will help the firm to unlock its full potential which now allegedly stands at only 0.1%.
“I know this is a controversial decision that may not be a fit for everyone, and there are definitely companies out there that thrive in remote or hybrid setups. But that’s not right for our type of business, and won’t help us fully realize our potential as a company,” Pei said.
This will be a big change for its employees. The company was established in 2020, during the COVID pandemic, and, naturally, was a fully remote firm.
“Remote work is not compatible with a high ambition level plus high speed,” Pei said.
His email to employees quite firmly suggests that people who are not willing to work from the office, should leave the company.
Nothing reportedly has over 17,000 employees. Those, who are not ready to come back to the office, are trusted “to make the right decision” since Nothing is “a company for grown ups.”
The return to the office will take effect two months from now.
“We know it’s not the right type of setup for everybody, and that’s OK. We should look for a mutual fit. You should find an environment where you thrive, and we need to find people who want to go the full mile with us in the decades ahead,” Pei said.
This is yet another sign that the remote work era might be coming to an end.
“Google decided that work-life balance, going home early, and working from home, was more important than winning. And the startups, the reason startups work is the people work like hell,” former Google CEO Eric Schmidt recently said.
Although he later backtracked on his statement, as reported by The Wall Street Journal, saying he misspoke about Google, it doesn't change the general vibe in the job market.
While for some employees coming back to the office might be just a minor inconvenience of, for example, commuting, so-called overemployed people are getting anxious.
During COVID, workers started juggling jobs – signing up remote work contracts so they could have two or even more 9-to-5 careers. Some reportedly did so to travel around the world and send kids to private schools, others were forced into overemployment by debts.
While in some cases, an overemployed person might do their two jobs well, it came to light that many are using mouse jigglers or similar devices to imitate work. And employers like Well Fargo are catching up with the trend.
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