Yahoo Finance WFH fight intensifies as Amazon staff threaten mass exodus: ‘Morale is gone’
Three-quarters of Amazon’s corporate staff are threatening to quit after the tech giant announced its return-to-office mandate.
Amazon is facing a mass exodus after it told staff it would be permanently axing work from home (WFH) from January. Tech giant Atlassian has slammed Amazon over the mandate and has now made a ploy to win over its workers.
A staggering 73 per cent of Amazon’s corporate staff have revealed they are considering looking for another job due to the office mandate, a survey of 2,585 verified staff by professional social network Blind found. Ninety-one per cent said they were “dissatisfied” with the move.
Four in five Amazon workers said they knew someone at the e-commerce company who was threatening to look for another job due to the new policy, while a third knew someone who had already quit.
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“My morale for this job is gone, gonna totally check out till PIP (performance improvement plans),” one verified Amazon employee told Blind.
Another Amazon employee called the blanket policy “crazy” and shared they had been hired as a remote worker and lived far away from an office.
“I have kids and family here so unwilling to relocate,” they said.
Another said they felt “dejected” by the decision but were thankful they had the flexibility to move jobs if needed.
“Decisions like the one from Jassy are a big reason why I don’t want kids. I don’t need others to impose rules that ruin my quality of life,” the worker said.
Atlassian offers to hire unhappy Amazon staff
Atlassian slammed Amazon’s return-to-office mandate, with the company’s head of team anywhere Annie Dean accusing the tech giant of “wilfully endorsing the old way as a solution to new problems”.
The Aussie company has long been critical of the mandates, with CEO Mike Cannon-Brookes labelling them “draconian”. Atlassian has allowed staff to “work from anywhere”, including from home or one of the company’s global offices, since 2020.
Atlassian work futurist Dominic Price said he wasn’t “going to hate” on companies that enforce return-to-office mandates on staff.
“If that's the employee value proposition that they think works for the majority of their people, stakeholders, customers, and shareholders, then that's their job as a leader,” he wrote on LinkedIn.
“As long as they communicate with transparency, and they are fair to their people, then I'm OK.”
But when it comes to the people side of things, Price said companies made decisions “for the majority and not everyone”.
“If you're somewhere and there's been a mandate that demonstrably changes your life (for the worse), then I'd love to let you know that Atlassian is hiring,” he said, sharing that the company had 304 roles open around the world.
“I appreciate that I get to thrive at work and life. That I get to achieve my goals, and be a good dad. That I can knock a project out of the park, and be home for dinner.”
WFH tide is turning
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy told staff they would be required to come back into the office full-time from January next year, including 7,000 people in Australia.
In a memo to staff, Jassy said the company continued to “believe that the advantages of being together in the office are significant”.
He noted it was easier for staff to learn, collaborate and brainstorm in the office, and let the company “strengthen” its culture and teams to be “better connected to one another”.
Aussie gambling company Tabcorp also joined the tide, with CEO Gillon McLachlan ordering 1,000 employees back into the office effective immediately. McLachlan said this would drive a “winning culture” and “deliver outcomes and success”.
The NSW government notably told all public sector workers to return to the office last month, with the Victorian government telling public servants they could always move interstate.
Commonwealth Bank faced backlash from some of its 49,000 staff when it ordered them back into the office just 50 per cent of the time.
Robert Half research found about two in five Aussie employees were expected to come into the office full-time, which is double the number recorded last year.
Recruitment expert Graham Wynn said the private sector had been pushing for a return to office for a while now and more companies would follow.
"I think, realistically, people have to accept it is going to happen, and we're certainly seeing a huge decrease in the number of companies offering jobs with work-from-home or hybrid opportunities,” he said.
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