Computer manufacturer Dell announced during the pandemic that it would let employees work from home if they wanted to. Three years later, that sounds very different.
Due to the risk of viruses during the corona pandemic, many companies worked almost exclusively in the home office – and suddenly it became clear: the work can be done from there just as well as in the office. This is also the case with the US computer manufacturer Dell, where this realization led management to make grandiose announcements.
Jeff Clarke, Dell’s vice chairman and COO and responsible for day-to-day operations at the company, predicted in late summer 2020 – after a few months of working from home – that they would “never go back to the way things were before”. He assumed that 60 percent of his employees would work completely from home or only in the office for a day or two. This development didn’t seem to bother him, on the contrary. But almost three years later, that has changed fundamentally.
Dell employees should be in the office for at least three days
As the magazine “The Register” reports, Dell is bringing its employees back to the offices. According to an internal email from Clarke, they should work on site again at least three days a week. At least this applies to all employees whose commute to work is no more than an hour. Dell has also hired a lot of workers who don’t live close to the offices since the pandemic – Clarke sold this as a big advantage of the Covid-19 period as it gives it a “larger pool of talent”.
The manufacturer of computers and storage media should nevertheless remain flexible: the employees can decide for themselves on which days they want to come into the office. There should also be a transition period. “We recognize that it will take time to prepare and get used to being in the office more regularly,” Clarke’s memo quoted The Register as saying.
During the work time
What private things can I do in my home office?
During Corona, Dell was still convinced of the home office
That sounds different than what the COO said three years ago. At that time he had emphasized: “Work is something you do, a result, not a place or a time.” Company boss Michael Dell had a similar statement last September: “In my experience, you make a mistake when you rely on fixed working hours in a traditional office to promote collaboration and instill a sense of belonging to your organization.”
With its retreat, Dell is one of a whole series of tech companies that are moving away from working from home again. At companies like Apple or Amazon, attendance is increasingly compulsory again. IBM CEO recently warned that employees who would work a lot in the home office would have less chance of being promoted.
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Source: Stern
