Apple reportedly delays return to the office amid rising Covid-19 cases

This comes after the tech giant told employees it wanted them to work from the office for three days a week starting September

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Credit: picjumbo_com

20 July 2021

Apple has reportedly pushed back its employees’ return to the office by at least a month due to a spike in coronavirus variants in a number of countries.

The deadline is now thought to be set for October at the earliest, people familiar with the matter told Bloomberg. This makes it one of the first US tech giants to delay its plans for the return to the office.

Furthermore, Apple is reportedly going to give its employees at least a month’s warning before ordering them to return to the office.

In June, The Verge reported that Apple employees were pushing back against a policy that would require them to return to the office three days a week starting in September. An internal letter revealed that the policy had forced some of the company’s employees to quit.

“Without the inclusivity that flexibility brings, many of us feel we have to choose between either a combination of our families, our well-being, and being empowered to do our best work, or being a part of Apple,” said the letter.

Meanwhile, Salesforce’s CEO Marc Benioff said in June he expected at least half of his employees to continue working from home after the pandemic. In February, the company’s president and chief people officer Brent Hyder claimed that the 9-to-5 workday was “dead”, but said its demise would lead to a greater work-life balance and better business overall.

Similarly, VMware announced in December it would allow employees to continue to work from home to promote inclusion and help the environment. Staff members would be able to choose from permanent remote work, “flexible working, working near a VMware office, or working full-time from a VMware office.”

Research also showed in April that UK businesses would struggle to attract talented developers in the next 12 months unless they are more willing to implement remote working. Recruitment platform CodinGame believes that without an offer to work remotely, UK organisations will not be able to attract DevOps specialists, cloud experts, and other in-demand developer roles.

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