Amazon corporate employees returning to office 5 days a week, CEO says

Amazon corporate workers are headed back to the office five days a week, the company’s CEO said Monday.

CEO Andy Jassy published his memo to employees, highlighting ” a couple changes we’re making to further strengthen our culture and teams.”

Noting how many departments at the giant were growing, he talked about the “culture” that has kept him at Amazon for 27 years.

In an effort “to operate like the world’s largest startup,” Jassy said he wants the company to speed up a lot of its processes and decision-making, and increase collaboration.

So in order to be “better set up to invent, collaborate, and be connected enough to each other and our culture to deliver the absolute best for customers and the business, we’ve decided that we’re going to return to being in the office the way we were before the onset of COVID,” he continued.

The company’s previous decision to return to the office three days a week led to a conclusion that “collaborating, brainstorming… inventing” and “connection” would improve even further.

He added that remote work would still be acceptable under different circumstances, and some will be exempt, but the “expectation is that people will be in the office outside of extenuating circumstances.” Workers will have until Jan. 2, 2025 to make necessary arrangements.

Elsewhere, Jassy said they would restructure by cutting the number of managers; he did not indicate whether that’d be done through layoffs or reassignments.

At the company’s headquarters in Washington state and Arlington, Va., corporate staff will have assigned desks moving forward as well.

“Having the right culture at Amazon is something I don’t take for granted,” he concluded. “I continue to believe that we are all here because we want to make a difference in customers’ lives, invent on their behalf, and move quickly to solve their problems. I’m optimistic that these changes will better help us accomplish these goals while strengthening our culture and the effectiveness of our teams.”