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Date: September 16, 2023

The most used software for remote team coordination and meetings is now calling back its remote employees living within 50 miles to work from the office.

All the employees who live within a 50-mile radius of the Zoom company’s offices must work from the office at least 2 days a week. This is the latest update on the work policy of Zoom for its employees, who, till now, used to work from home completely. 

We believe that a structured hybrid approach — meaning employees that live near an office need to be onsite two days a week to interact with their teams — is most effective for Zoom, and as a company, we are in a better position to use our own technologies, continue to innovate, and support our global customers.

Colleen Rodriguez, Zoom’s Head of global PR

The Work From Home culture started back during the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic to keep the workforce working and curb business loss while sustaining operations. However, tools like Zoom have done more than just help businesses sustain themselves. 

Zoom became the go-to solution for remote work coordination, conducting interviews, onboarding and deboarding employees, and critical meetings while keeping the safety of employees intact. Considering how essential Zoom is for businesses that still follow the work-from-home model, it is ironic for the company to call back its employees to work from the office.

Hybrid is the New Normal

The company has not completely revoked the Work From Home policy. It is rather taking a slow approach toward the work-from-office culture by switching to a hybrid mode for now. The new rules will be applicable from August onwards and can take up to September to be implemented across all global branches.

“We’ll continue to leverage the entire Zoom platform to keep our employees and dispersed teams connected and working efficiently,” said Rodriguez while discussing why the essential tool for Work From Home is taking such measures. He also said that Zoom is actually one of the last companies from the Big Tech industry to take this step.

Who Else Adopted the Hybrid Mode?

Google, the largest search engine in the world, has adopted a 3-days a week hybrid policy in multiple US locations since April 2022. Starting last September, Apple workers around the bay area had to go to the office for 3 days at least a week. Elon Musk has already quite abruptly shifted to complete work from office mode soon after he took over the CEO of Twitter last year.

We will see a growing shift in the work culture again as the pandemic-led Work From Home culture is fading away both in terms of mandates and efficiency. We do know that the employees are not fully in agreement with these changes as they have become habituated to this new norm as it helps them have a better work-life balance.

By Arpit Dubey

Arpit is a dreamer, wanderer, and a tech nerd who loves to jot down tech musings and updates. With a logician mind, he is always chasing sunrises and tech advancements while secretly preparing for the robot uprising.