Last week, Elon Musk said in a leaked email to Tesla executives that Tesla workers need to stop working from home and spend at least 40 hours a week in the office.
“If not‘We will assume that you have resigned, “Musk wrote. When challenged on Twitter for the email, he replied, “They have to pretend to work somewhere else.”
The ruling was shocking from what we learned in the last two years about remote work and the employees who are now pushing for it.
A few days later, he announced that Tesla should cut its staff by 10% (about 10,000 employees). A coincidence? I do not think.
It turned out that Musk was not mistaken. Instead, he deliberately tried to lay off employees.
Why Musk’s attitude to remote work is dishonest and wrong
Musk said on Twitter that working from home was a “pretense” job. He is dishonest. He really doesn’t believe that.
Tesla’s corporate culture is driven by employees who work more than 40 hours a week. In fact, the company’s success and dominance in the electric car market depend on employees working 60 or 70 hours a week. (Musk himself claims to work between 80 and 90 hours a week.)
Still, Musk intends to spend only 40 hours a week in the office.
Something beyond that is just a “pretend” job? If Musk really believed that working from home was just a fake job, he would order all 60 or 70 hours to be spent in the office.
No. Musk knows that employees who work 40 hours in the office and the rest at home are very productive, working remotely.
In fact, everyone should know this by now.
According to new data from Stanford University professor Nicholas Bloom, employees working from home they are now more productive than they were at the beginning of the pandemic. (This conclusion is from self-reported data and objective performance measures.)
It turns out that employees adapt behaviorally and psychologically to telecommuting. And companies are adapting their management systems, technologies and workflow systems to follow suit.
An additional factor, according to Bloom, is that we are no longer under the pressure of the blockade – employees are re-engaging with their social support systems – day care, school, friends and everyone else.
Remote workers are also happier, according to the mental health research website Tracking Happiness. This means that they are more committed to the company’s goals, less likely to leave and more productive.
Why Musk will change his tune
I predict that Musk will soften his term when he sees who is leaving and where these valuable employees are going for their new jobs. Every major Silicon Valley company that has issued official decrees has changed its mind.
Apple has departed from such a requirement – announced that employees will have to work in the office at least three days a week. Employees rebelled and a major AI leader left and went to work for rival Google.
Google itself has recently relinquished such mandates. The Google Maps team told the contractors that they are required to work in the office full-time from June 6.
After threatening to strike, Google has extended the term by three months.
Musk is a capitalist. So he needs to know that the labor market is a market.
Employees – including highly valued employees on whom Tesla depends for its success – will leave and go to work for Tesla’s competition.
While he may think that forced office hours will relieve Tesla of the burden of layoffs, the overall mandate takes control of how many employees leave and who actually walk out the door.
Overall, I expect the company’s most valuable employees to receive the best offers from the competition and be the first to leave.
Elon Musk is a lot of things – a troll on Twitter, a shooter in hip-hop and a renegade – but he’s not stupid. So he will change his mind about the mandate.
Copyright © 2022 IDG Communications, Inc.
https://www.computerworld.com/article/3662816/why-elon-musks-back-to-office-mandate-will-backfire.html
