Amazons CEO Andy Jassy tells corporate workers to come in 3 days a week. There was no information about the specific days that employees will be required to work in offices. Jassy expressed that bringing back thousands of employees to office buildings in the Seattle region will provide a boost to small businesses in his decision to make changes to their back-to-office policy.
The numbers shows that more business is needed downtown. A recent study measured economic and social activity downtown compared to pre-pandemic levels. An analysis from the University of California Berkeley and University of Toronto ranked Seattle almost last at No. 27 in a list of 31 large cities. The Office building attendance in downtown Seattle this past November increased year-over-year from 15-20% to 35-60%. The percentage of 2019 worker foot traffic in downtown Seattle compared to 2022 improved over the past year but is still hovering around 40%.
A long memo was released at Amazon let’s the readers into the thinking process. The memo sent to employees by the CEO included a message about the policy to get workers back in the office stating, “S-team listened to employees, watched how our teams performed, talked to leaders at other companies, and got together on several occasions to discuss if and how we should adjust our approach… And ultimately, they’ve led us to conclude that we should go back to being in the office together the majority of the time (at least three days per week). We made this decision at a s-team meeting earlier this week, and for a number of reasons (including the adjustments I know will be required for some of our employees), I wanted to share with you as early as I could even though we haven’t worked out all the execution details yet. Of course, as there were before the pandemic, there will still be certain roles (e.g. some of our salespeople, customer support, etc.) and exceptions to these expectations, but that will be a small minority. We plan to implement this change effective May 1.”
The pandemic increased online buying astronomically. Amazon went on a hiring spree to help meet demand as more people spent time online. The company employs 75,000 people in the Seattle region. They are part of the corporate and tech workers that make up its workforce of 1.54 million people around the world.
Late last year Amazon laid off 18,000 people. Layoffs targeted those working on the company’s Echo devices and Alexa voice assistant, retail operations, and human resources. The cuts are the largest in Amazon’s 28-year history.
Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell noted that “some workers are facing increasing pressure to be in the office on at least a part-time basis, but a return to a full-time, 5-day a week office presence seems unlikely for many.” “I cannot mandate people to come downtown unless there’s something to drive them there,” he said.
