(Bloomberg) -- The chief executive officer of BT Group Plc is taking a tougher line on enforcing the company’s hybrid working policy to get staff back in the office more frequently from January, according to a report in the Financial Times.
CEO Alison Kirkby said BT’s current guidance asking office-based employees coming into the office three days a week will become mandatory, in a memo seen by the FT. Data on employees coming into the office will be shared with managers, making it “clear who isn’t meeting the requirements,” the memo said.
“Current attendance levels are not going to help us to transform BT Group, or nurture a more integrated, collaborative culture,” Kirkby said in the October email. Among BT’s office-based staff, 35% were “only coming in one day a week or not at all, and overall, an average of 1.7 days a week in the office,” she said.
BT confirmed the move in a statement to Bloomberg on Sunday, saying: “We have had guidance in place to support a hybrid approach to office-based work since 2022 and are now making this a company-wide policy.”
A number of companies are making changes to policies in order to bring employees into the office more often. Deutsche Bank AG agreed new work-from-home rules with labor representatives last month, while Amazon.com Inc employees will need to come to the office five days a week from next year. Starbucks Corp. told employees they could be fired if they don’t attend the office three days a week.
Kirkby announced an ambitious turnaround plan this year that involves focusing on the UK at the expense of international markets and cutting costs. BT’s cost-cutting changes include partnering with operators in other markets or exiting them altogether, Kirkby said after the company published earnings last month.
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