Have you heard? Amazon’s CEO, Andy Jassy has announced that all employees are required to be back in the office five days a week from January 2025, in his words ‘returning to the way we were before the onset of the pandemic’. However, it’s important to recognize that none of us are the same as we were before the pandemic, and neither are our workplaces. Amazon’s back to office mandate bucks the general trend such that only two out of every 10 employers have employees back in the office full time with the rest practicing a variety of options on the continuum from fully online to partial back to office.
Post pandemic, the tech industry has broadly embraced remote and hybrid work. In light of this, Amazon’s decision is bound to spark conversations in C-suites across the world. The penchant for return to office policies was mostly being dismissed as executive nostalgia for a work model that worked years ago but unlikely to be effective in the post COVID workplace reality. Organizational researchers investigating the issue from both sides of the argument have put forth mixed results and therefore, most leaders have their own gut instinct to guide this decision making.
Amazon’s plan may set a new precedent, but managers shouldn’t wait to see how it unfolds. Instead, it is time to manage up, where, managing up is about engaging with leadership in positive and collaborative manner to help organizations create value. Managers need an approach that is intentional and proactive for contributing to organizational decision-making around these mandates before these are set in stone.
Why Managers Need to Pay Attention
Andy Jassy’s announcement about employees’ return to office also includes a plan to flatten the organization by increasing the ratio of individual contributors to managers by 15% by the end of the first quarter of 2025. While this might seem like a logical way to streamline operations and cut bureaucracy, it puts additional pressure on managers to implement the back-to-office mandate efficiently. They face the challenge of transitioning employees quickly and smoothly without any productivity losses, while at the same time worrying about their own job security as Amazon reduces its management pool.
Amazon, with its 1.5 million employees, is second only to Walmart in terms of workforce size. This makes its policies influential, not just within its own ranks but across industries. Managers must act now to navigate this complex terrain effectively.
Strategies For Managing Up
1. Get Buy-In, Don’t Mandate
Mandates rarely work well, as organizations learned the hard way with vaccine, masking and social distancing mandates during the Covid-19 pandemic. When it comes to returning to the office, many employees reject the idea of a five-day in-office schedule. A case in point: Yahoo! under Marissa Mayer, whose strict telecommuting ban led to attrition and low morale, worsened the company’s already precarious situation.
Managers need to help leadership understand that mandates can violate employees’ psychological contracts, undermining trust and autonomy. Open and honest communication to justify back to work is a critical first step so employees feel heard and supported. This needs to happen not just in a memo but in multiple settings and multiple times. Virtual or in-person forums, where senior leaders display genuine empathy and practice active listening skills, will allow employees to engage in open dialogue, share their concerns, and work toward solutions that make the transition smoother and more agreeable for all.
2. Focus On Autonomy, Not Just Flexibility
Research in Harvard Business Review suggests that employees value autonomy just as much if not more than flexibility. This presents an opportunity for managers to collaborate with leadership to redefine roles and responsibilities in a way that gives employees more control over how they complete their work. Managers can help design performance systems that allow co-creation of goals and expectations with employees. Enabling workers to feel more ownership of their work, builds their motivation towards increased productivity, with an added potential benefit of alleviating resistance to the new office arrangements.
3. Clarify Organization’s Stance On Work-Life Balance
Managers should engage leadership in discussions about how the return-to-office mandate aligns with the company’s stance on work-life balance. Many employees, especially those with families, prefer remote work as it helps them manage their personal and professional commitments more effectively. Research with 800 companies analyzed over 30 years indicates that organizations that support work-life balance see greater diversity and improved well-being, as well as, higher retention and increased productivity. Managers need to engage with senior leadership to help clarify its commitment to employee well-being as well as diversity while implementing return-to-office initiative.
4. Align With Sustainability Goals
According to EPA study, transportation accounted for almost 30% of the total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions in 2022. When you factor in the energy consumption of physical office spaces—lighting, heating, and cooling—the impact becomes even greater.
Amazon has made public commitments to reduce its carbon footprint and achieve net-zero emissions by 2040. Managers should seek clarity on how a return to daily commuting fits with these goals. Senior leaders need to be made aware of significant adverse effect on customer perception of companies with sustainability pledges incongruous with policies. If companies do not address this contradiction, they risk alienating customers for perceived greenwashing.
Conclusion
Amazon’s return-to-office mandate is more than just a directive from the top—it’s a wake-up call for managers to become more involved in shaping their organization’s future. Increased productivity can be achieved by advocating for employee autonomy, aligning with goals of work-life balance, and sustainability. Managers can help ensure that this transition is both smooth and strategic by managing up. While Amazon may be setting a bold precedent, it’s the managers who will determine whether this shift strengthens the organization or leads to unintended consequences. The time to act is now.