Why More Bosses Than Workers Plan To Quit Over Office Return Policies

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So much of the hand-wringing over return-to-office mandates seems to be directed at more junior workers from their CEOs. Top leaders seem convinced Gen Z employees are a little lazy when it comes to regular office attendance, unproductive if they’re not in workplace cubicles, and that they’re losing out on precious skills if they’re not spending time in the same physical space as their colleagues.

While there may be truth to some of those notions, leaders might want to worry about their managers instead. I explored two reports last week that found that executive-level employees were not only more likely to say they would quit over an in-office mandate—33% said it would send them to the exits in a Gartner survey, compared with just 19% of non-executives—but there’s evidence that some of them have done so already. A working academic paper looked at résumé data from three major tech firms and found evidence the tenure of the workforce declined after an office return policy was added (more on that here).

As we approach the fourth official start of summer since the pandemic began, it’s unbelievable to think this debate is still going on. More companies are tightening their approaches to remote work—Walmart said last week that it’s asking the majority of remote employees to relocate to its home office in Arkansas or to other offices in San Francisco or the New York metropolitan area. Four years in, what will that look like during summer’s lull—when people increasingly take workations with kids out of school or “hush trips” while working remotely? I’m curious to hear from you what you’re seeing.

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

Livongo cofounder Glen Tullman has a new startup and wants to help employers lower healthcare costs with AI, but it may be just another Band-aid for America’s $4.5 billion healthcare bill, writes Forbes senior writer Katie Jennings. Think of it as ChatGPT for health insurance, aiming to answer health insurance-related questions such as, “How much will I have to pay for this doctor’s visit?” Transcarent, which offers an app with 24/7 chat-based primary care services, lower cost drug options, referrals and second opinions, has raised $450 million since its founding in 2020.

Colorado is poised to become the first state in the U.S. to enact a comprehensive law addressing the use of artificial intelligence in employment, writes senior contributor Alonzo Martinez. The bill passed the state legislature May 8 and now awaits the signature of Governor Jared Polis. If signed into law, it will take full effect in 2026 and aims to prevent algorithmic discrimination. The Biden administration also issued eight major guidelines for using artificial intelligence at work, and they include establishing human oversight and ensuring transparency about when AI systems are being used with workers and job seekers.

HUMAN CAPITAL

Microsoft has asked some of its artificial intelligence and cloud business employees in China to consider moving out of the country, according to a Wall Street Journal report, amid ongoing geopolitical and trade tensions as the Biden administration attempts to curb China’s access to advanced technology. The Journal’s report said around 700 to 800 Microsoft staffers in China have received offers to move to countries such as the U.S. and Australia; Reuters reported that Microsoft responded by saying internal transfers are a “regular part” of its global operations and confirmed “an optional internal transfer opportunity” was offered to some workers.

As the accounting profession sees an exodus of talent and new college graduates avoid the sector, the industry faces an existential threat, writes Forbes senior contributor Jack Kelly. The number of accountants in the U.S. has fallen 15.9% since 2019, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Kelly spotlights accounting startup Puzzle, which is leveraging AI and automation to streamline accounting and financial management where there is currently a talent shortage—but may do little to lure more white-collar workers into a field.

WHAT’S NEXT: GDIT President Amy Gilliland

May is Mental Health Awareness Month, so I couldn’t help but share the conversation my colleague Megan Poinski had with Amy Gilliland, the president of global tech company and defense contractor General Dynamics Information Technology (GDIT). The company has had a comprehensive program to focus on mental wellness since 2021, with a campaign titled “How Are You, Really?,” which has received praise from both employees and mental health organizations. Check out the full interview here, which was excerpted in Poinski’s CEO newsletter. (And sign up for that here!) As always, the conversation has been edited for length, clarity and continuity.

Note to readers: This interview mentions suicide and other reasons for mental distress.

Poinski: Why did you start focusing on mental health at GDIT?

Gilliland: I was at a local lake for a long weekend, and one of my reports called me to say that somebody [who] was quite prevalent at GDIT had committed suicide. In that moment, I decided that GDIT needed to play a role in this, and that we would make a commitment to taking on this subject and trying to help employees and their families.

I think we all know how stressed everybody was at that moment. Our kids were learning from home, or were recovering from learning from home. People had lost people in their lives. Support networks had failed. And the economy: inflation was rising. And we had the George Floyd incident. There was a lot of disruption and turmoil, and it was all coming together at a time also when people did not have access to the resources, or there weren’t enough resources to tackle that. I just was committed to doing something.

I came back and talked to my brilliant team here, and put together this campaign, which we termed “How Are You, Really?” Oftentimes in the office, at the watercooler, you ask somebody, “How are you?” and then I just keep walking down the hall, saying, “Oh, I’m living the dream,” roll your eyes, right? But this is encouraging employees to ask—and to really care about what the response is.

What does this campaign entail?

We realized that being a leader post-Covid is different than being a leader pre-Covid. You have generational changes in the workforce. You have different work postures, in terms of working from home. The mission that we serve is very dynamic, and given the geopolitical things that are going on, there’s a lot at work here. We are putting all of our people managers through training, and one of the parts of that training is how you have hard conversations, particularly around things like mental health. We have set an expectation for our leaders that part of their job is to make their employees successful, and part of that is being willing to engage in conversations about mental health, were they to think that something was going on. That really starts with “How Are You, Really?” kinds of conversations. It may not be the first time, or the second time, or the third time, but ultimately, you can make an employee feel like it’s okay to not be okay.

We’ve had lots of speaker events. We’ve had experts come in and talk about everything from stress and anxiety management to suicide prevention. That can be very nuanced to different parts of our employee base. … We hosted, with our employee resource group for our early career employees, a segment at lunch about depression and anxiety and the realities of it. It is one of our best-attended ever in terms of internal [events].

We’re continuing to evolve what we’re offering because the situation is evolving. This year, we are focusing on encouraging people to find a community at GDIT. If you’re a technologist and you want to go hang out with your cloud engineers, here’s a community for you. If you are an early career employee, then here is the early career employee resource group. One of the realities of the world that we live in now, in the aftermath of Covid, is that people are more isolated than they were before.

What has employee reaction been to the program?

About 30% of my population are veterans; 14,000 to 15,000 of my 20,000 employees have security clearances. In both of those demographics of employees, there is a built-in aversion to talking about mental health. In the military, you just trudge on. … Those with security clearances feel like they might lose their clearance if the approvers think that they have a mental health challenge, which is not true. We have also brought our internal conversation externally to try and disabuse people of these stigmas, or false beliefs that they’re going to lose their clearance. Really, it’s in .00001% of cases.

What advice would you give to an executive who is interested in starting a similar program at their workplace?

They can call us. We’d be happy to share our resources. We have an external website that talks about resources that are out there. There’s plenty of organizations that support this also. The [National Alliance on Mental Illness] has resources. We built this organically, so we worked our way through it.

I think an important thing to do is to listen to employees, because employees really helped us build a meaningful program here.

I would also tell them that this does not have to cost a lot of money. We’ve introduced flexibility in places where we can be flexible, and that helps employees. If we have somebody that needs to take a step away, we’ve come up with ways to allow them to step away and they don’t have to quit.

The other advice that I would give is that leaders have to own this, too. Your leaders have to go along this journey because they will be critical to demonstrating the kinds of behaviors that need to be pushed down through the organization, for employees to feel like this is more than just another initiative that goes out there.

If you or someone you know is struggling or in crisis, call or text the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988 for free, confidential support 24 hours a day, seven days a week. An online chat is also available.

STRATEGIES + ADVICE

Everything you need to know about today’s freelance workforce—and why “portfolio careers” are the future of work.

Don’t scare away great talent from seeking promotions. Here’s how it can happen.

Feeling unmotivated at work? In the Harvard Business Review, two researchers share advice for getting out of a rut.

FACTS + COMMENT

Forbes was a media partner for the Moms First Summit on May 14 in New York, an inaugural gathering of founders, CEOs and political leaders for discussions about the challenges of working motherhood and the structures and policies that could help support them. Reporter Maria Gracia Santillana Linares attended the event, which included high-profile speakers ranging from former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to activist and actress Geena Davis and Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer.

90% to 425%: A March study by Boston Consulting Group and Moms First found that employers who invested in childcare benefits saw a return on investment that ranged between these figures, based on the “net financial impact of childcare benefits.”

74%: The percentage of mothers with a child under the age of 18 who were either working or looking for work in 2023, up 1% from the year before, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

“A woman being able to get into the workforce is determined as much by daycare and by access to reproductive health as it is to a fair wage in the workplace,” said Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer in one of the keynote interviews.