Teleworking: this inconvenient truth about the forced return to the office

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Having just been appointed head of the mysterious Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), Elon Musk has every intention of cutting public sector staff. Among the strategies he intends to use, we find the forced return to the office of employees working remotely in order to push them to resign. Yet it is one of the worst ideas ever, according to a study conducted by researchers at the University of Pittsburgh.

A talent drain

To get a clearer picture, the scientists gathered data from 57 American companies in the S&P 500 (the 500 largest publicly traded companies). They then scanned 3 million LinkedIn profiles to see who left these companies following the measures forcing a return to work.

In detail, there was a 14% increase in the departure rate, which should not displease Elon Musk. On the other hand, the people who leave these companies the most are much more likely to be middle to senior managers and people who have mentioned the most skills on their profiles.

The authors explain precisely that the latter have many more opportunities than other employees and that they will therefore not hesitate to look elsewhere if a choice made by their hierarchy displeases them.

This results in a loss of talent for these organizations and a huge waste of time recruiting new profiles. In some cases, they are not even able to replace these positions, which can clearly hamper activity.

Additional figures

This is not the first time that the limits of these forced returns to the office have been demonstrated. For example, analysts from the startup Scoop have combed through data from the Flex Index, an analysis that compiles information such as a company's remote working policies and its turnover between 2020 and 2022.

And indeed, companies that allow their employees to freely choose their workplace or that are entirely remote have achieved a 21% growth in turnover. Conversely, those that require their teams to come and spend certain days of the week in the office achieve a growth of only 5%. Tolerance and a spirit of trust towards employees therefore seem to encourage them. To learn more about this research, click here.

Are you surprised by the results of these two studies ? Tell us in the comments.

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