The coronavirus pandemic has completely changed how many of us work. Most nonessential offices around the country closed in March, leading many employees to transition to working from home. Although some offices have now reopened, others remain closed — and may stay that way indefinitely.
While most major companies announced reopening plans for some time in 2021, some — like Twitter — are giving their employees the option to work remotely as long as they wish. Here’s when 21 major companies plan to reopen.
Last updated: Sept. 4, 2020
“We are extending the option for our employees to work remotely through the end of August 2021, even if their home office has reopened,” Airbnb announced in a company blog post in August. “Employee safety remains our focus, and while we don’t know when the pandemic will end, we want to provide our employees with flexibility and choice to make decisions about the next year. We are offering this remote working extension to give employees the ability to plan further ahead and make the choices they need around school calendars, being closer to family, caring for vulnerable family members, and other personal decisions.”
Although Amazon warehouse workers have been working throughout the pandemic, office employees have yet to make their return to work — and won’t until January of next year, Forbes reported.
“We continue to prioritize the health of our employees and follow local government guidance,” an Amazon spokesperson told Forbes. “Employees who work in a role that can effectively be done from home are welcome to do so until Jan. 8.”
Software company Atlassian announced in an internal blog post in August that although it would be reopening offices, employees would have the option to continue working from home as long as they wish, CNBC reported.
Capital One Financial CEO Richard Fairbank told employees in a May internal memo that offices in the U.S., Canada and the U.K. would remain shut to all nonessential staff through at least Labor Day, American Banker reported. It’s unclear if the reopening date has been pushed back further.
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ClassPass CEO Fritz Lanman told employees they will have the option to work from home for the remainder of 2020, Forbes reported.
In a May letter to employees, Coinbase co-founder and CEO Brian Armstrong announced that the cryptocurrency exchange would be a “remote-first” company going forward.
“In the future, anyone who wants to, can continue to work from an office. That won’t change,” he wrote. “What is changing is that (almost) any employee who prefers to work outside of an office, can. For many employees, it will probably be a mix of both.”
Discover Financial announced in May that employees would be able to work from home through the end of the year, Reuters reported.
“As a company, we will not rush, nor will we expect anyone to return to the office before they are ready,” CEO Roger Hochschild said, according to the news service.
“Based on guidance from health and government experts, as well as decisions drawn from our internal discussions about these matters, we are allowing employees to continue voluntarily working from home until July 2021,” a Facebook spokesman told CNBC in a statement.
Employees are allowed to return to offices earlier if they wish, though the spokesperson anticipated that many offices would remain closed through the end of 2020.
Facebook is also allowing employees to apply to work from home permanently, and CEO Mark Zuckerberg anticipates that half of the company’s workforce will be remote by 2030, Forbes reported.
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Fox Corp. hoped to welcome employees back to its offices in the fall, but in August, CEO Lachlan Murdoch wrote in a staff memo that “non-production employees who have been working remotely will continue to do so for the remainder of the calendar year,” The Hollywood Reporter reported.
“While we understand the desire to return to our pre-coronavirus ‘normal’ and see our friends and colleagues in person, our approach to fully reopening facilities is guided by your health and safety,” Murdoch wrote. “The rising rates of positive cases in areas where we have a significant presence coupled with evolving restrictions and best practices around the country are impacting and postponing our planned companywide return to work efforts this fall.”
“To give employees the ability to plan ahead, we’ll be extending our global voluntary work from home option through June 30, 2021 for roles that don’t need to be in the office,” Google CEO Sundar Pichai said to employees in a July memo obtained by CNN. “I hope this will offer the flexibility you need to balance work with taking care of yourselves and your loved ones over the next 12 months.”
In July, Business Insider and Insider launched its “15-5” Reopening Plan for employees in the New York City office, which involves having 15 to 25 employees in the office five days a week.
“We want to continue gradually allowing more people into the office on a regular basis between now and July 2021, which as we announced today is when we anticipate a full return to the office,” Shaq Lawson, director of operations at Business Insider and Insider, said to employees in a letter obtained by Talking Biz News. “We know that many of you are eager to return now or in the near future and we want to ensure you that we will continue to work on bringing more employees in. […] We will not require employees or teams to return to the office before Summer 2021 and will continue to monitor the situation.”
Instead of setting a firm reopening date, Mastercard is leaving it up to employees to decide when they will return to the office, Reuters reported.
“We have stated upfront to all our employees, that it is their choice … we want them to make the decision on when they feel comfortable returning to the office,” chief people officer Michael Fraccaro told the news service.
As of May, about 90% of Mastercard’s workforce was working remotely.
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Microsoft has unveiled a six-stage reopening plan, with the sixth stage — offices fully open — only occurring when most restrictions imposed during the pandemic have been lifted and health data suggests it’s safe to return, The Verge reported. As of late July, the tentative start date for stage six was Jan. 19, 2021, but it could be pushed back further.
“While we continue to work on plans to reopen our offices safely, the timing of when we bring employees back will be unique to each office — and we will continue to make those decisions in a way that’s consistent with local government guidelines and the advice of our medical experts and local leadership team,” Salesforce president and chief people officer Brent Hyder wrote in a company blog post in August. “Based on this guidance — and to give employees the ability to plan ahead — we have decided to extend our work-from-home period, allowing all employees to continue working from home until at least July 31, 2021.”
“As of today, Shopify is a digital by default company,” Shopify CEO Tobi Lutke announced on Twitter in May. “We will keep our offices closed until 2021 so that we can rework them for this new reality. And after that, most will permanently work remotely. Office centricity is over.”
Slack originally planned on reopening offices on Sept. 1, but announced in a June blog post that it was unknown when offices would be reopened “for limited use.” The company also announced that most employees would have the option to continue to “work remotely on a permanent basis if they choose.”
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Square CEO Jack Dorsey told employees in May that they would be able to work from home permanently with the exception of those that need to physically be in the office, such as security and facilities personnel, The Verge reported.
“We want employees to be able to work where they feel most creative and productive,” a company spokesperson told The Verge. “Moving forward, Squares will be able to work from home permanently, even once offices begin to reopen. Over the past several weeks, we’ve learned a lot about what it takes for people to effectively perform roles outside of an office, and we will continue to learn as we go.”
In a May email, Jack Dorsey, who is also CEO of Twitter, told employees that they would be allowed to work from home permanently with the exception of those with jobs that required them to be physically present, BuzzFeed News reported. At the time, Dorsey said that offices would reopen in September at the earliest and in-person events would be canceled for the remainder of 2020.
Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi told employees at a meeting in August that they would be allowed to work from home through June 2021, CNBC reported. Workers are allowed to return to offices early if they open before then.
“@Upwork knows firsthand the incredible outcomes that distributed teams can deliver. Building on our 20 years of experience as a remote work company, we are now permanently embracing a ‘remote-first’ model,” Hayden Brown, CEO of the freelancing platform tweeted in May. “Going forward, working remotely will be the default for everyone, while teams will also be able to come together — once it’s safe — for intentional collaboration and socialization. The #futureofwork is here.”
“Today we let our team know they have flexibility to work from home (or anywhere) through the end of 2020,” Zillow Group CEO Rich Barton tweeted in April. “My personal opinions about WFH have been turned upside down over the past 2 months. I expect this will have a lasting influence on the future of work … and home.”
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This article originally appeared on GOBankingRates.com: When These 21 Major Companies Are Heading Back to the Office
