Amazon, $AMZN, employees express dismay, anger about sudden return-to-office policy

Amazon, $AMZN, employees express dismay, anger about sudden return-to-office policy, per CNBC.

Amazon tech workers created a Slack channel and drafted an internal petition pushing back on the mandate, with the group retaining 16,000 members, and about 5,000 employees signing a petition.

“By arbitrarily forcing return-to-office without providing data to support it and despite clear evidence that it is the wrong decision for employees, Amazon has failed its role as earth’s best employer,” according to screenshots viewed by CNBC. “I believe this decision will be detrimental to our business and is antithetical to how we make decisions at Amazon.”

“We know that it won’t be perfect at first, but the office experience will steadily improve over the coming months (and years) as our real estate and facilities teams smooth out the wrinkles, and ultimately keep evolving how we want our offices to be set up to capture the new ways we want to work,” Jassy of $AMZN wrote.

Jassy announced Amazon would require corporate staffers to spend at least three days a week in the office beginning May 1. Jassy said he and Amazon’s leadership team, known as the S-team, decided it would be easier for employees to collaborate and invent together in person and that in-person work would strengthen the company’s culture.