Amazon Executive Defends New In-Office Policy

By Greg Bensinger

(Reuters) – One of Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN)'s top executives defended the new, controversial 5-day-per-week in-office policy on Thursday, stating that employees who oppose it can leave for other companies.

Speaking at an all-hands meeting for AWS, unit CEO Matt Garman mentioned that nine out of ten workers he spoke with support the new policy set to take effect in January, according to a transcript reviewed by Reuters.

He suggested that those who prefer not to work in-office five days a week can resign, saying, "If there are people who just don't work well in that environment and don't want to, that's okay, there are other companies around."

He clarified, "By the way, I don't mean that in a bad way," emphasizing the desire for a collaborative environment.

Garman added, "When we want to really, really innovate on interesting products, I have not seen an ability for us to do that when we're not in-person."

The policy has triggered discontent among many Amazon employees, who argue it creates unnecessary commuting time and lacks support from independent data regarding the benefits of returning to the office.

Previously, Amazon enforced a three-day in-office policy, but CEO Andy Jassy announced last month a shift to five days for better collaboration and connectivity.

Some employees, previously non-compliant to the office requirement, were reportedly told they were "voluntarily resigning" and subsequently locked out of company systems.

As the second-largest private employer globally, Amazon has adopted a stricter approach to returning to the office compared to tech giants like Google (NASDAQ:GOOGL), Meta (NASDAQ:META), and Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT), which have implemented two- to three-day in-office policies.

"I'm actually quite excited about this change," Garman stated, acknowledging the mixed reactions from employees. He asserted that achieving the company's objectives was challenging under the previous three-day policy, which hindered collaboration due to varying office attendance.

Garman emphasized that Amazon's leadership principles were difficult to uphold with only a three-day work requirement, noting the need for daily experience rather than theoretical understanding.

The principle of "disagree and commit," which allows employees to voice concerns before fully committing to a project, he argued, is not conducive to remote work. "I don't know if you guys have tried to disagree via a Chime call," he said. "It's very hard."