Facebook parent Meta is ordering most of its employees to work in-person at least three days a week starting in September – the latest change in Mark Zuckerberg’s ongoing “year of efficiency” at the tech giant that cut 21,000 jobs .
The change will take effect on September 5 and will only apply to hybrid employees assigned to a specific Meta office, the company confirmed on Friday. Employees classified as fully remote are not affected.
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“We are committed to distributed work and confident that people can make a meaningful impact both in the office and at home,” a Meta spokesperson said in a statement about the change.
“We are also committed to continually refining our model to foster the collaboration, relationships and culture needed for employees to do their best work,” added the spokesperson.
The return-to-office policy adjustment was the strictest of its kind since Zuckerberg embraced the flexibility of remote work during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The company imposed two major rounds of layoffs — 10,000 this spring after losing 11,000 last fall, as Zuckerberg looks to cut expenses and refocus Meta’s business on the metaverse and artificial intelligence.
Currently, Meta employees average about 2.2 days a week in the office, according to an internal memo obtained by the Wall Street Journal.
About three-quarters of the company’s workforce is assigned to an office.
Meta had around 86,000 employees at the end of last year.
Zuckerberg encouraged Meta employees to spend more time in the office in a blog post in March, even as he insisted the company was “committed to distributed work.”
“Our initial analysis of performance data suggests that engineers who joined Meta in person and then moved to remote or stayed in person performed better, on average, than people who joined remotely,” said Zuckerberg.
The return to the office could exacerbate a morale crisis at Meta, where employees have complained about large layoffs and complained that some top executives run their divisions from locations far from the company’s California headquarters.
Meta isn’t the only tech company making changes to its office policy.
On Wednesday, angry Amazon workers staged a high-profile walkout in protest against the company’s return to office and its climate policies.
Other companies, including Google, Apple and Microsoft, have also increased their on-site work requirements.
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