IBM CEO Arvind Krishna recently announced that an employee’s career progression could suffer if they do not return to their office. In an interview with Bloomberg, he said: “Remote work can be hazardous to your career.” This statement applies to individuals looking to advance professionally in their current career, urged to work from the office for the majority of their time.
IBM is unlike some other companies that have forced all their workers to return to the office. Nevertheless, they expect and encourage their employees to visit the office three days a week to best succeed in their careers. It is more important for managers and those looking to move up in their career to physically be present in the office in order to prove their skills and foster relationships that cannot be nurtured online.
On the other hand, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy has also asked for employees to return to the office; however, Google Cloud workers were told to return three days a week, only to be requested to share desks with colleagues on one of those days. This mixed messaging from corporations begs the question: why are policies regarding worker return being mentioned now?
Notably, this conversation has surfaced close to IBM’s reported plans to pause 7,800 recruitment spots and replace them with artificial intelligence tasks in back-office jobs. This plan could possibly reduce the importance of having their workers visibly present in the office.
Nevertheless, such matters in the corporate world emphasize that it is important to stay alert to new policies and readjust one’s working strategy in order to make sure they are at the top of their professional game.
