Google employees won't be returning to campus any time soon as Google has decided to keep everyone working from home for at least another year.
As The Wall Street Journal reports, last week Google CEO Sundar Pichai held a debate with Google's other top executives. Following the discussion, it was decided the work from home policy was set to stay in place until July 2021. In a note to staff, Pichai explained, "I know it hasn’t been easy ... 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."
The decision extends beyond the US, with Google employees continuing to work from home in all of company's other locations, including the UK, Brazil, and India. As well as keeping employees safe during the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, it's hoped that by extending the policy for a year, decisions are easier to make regarding education for children and leases for homes.
Each of the large tech companies decided on different timescales for when staff should return to work. Until today, Google was expecting employees to return in January. Amazon plans to bring staff back in October, and Twitter has gone in the opposite direction and made working from home a permanent option for some employees. After initially expecting employees back in July, Facebook may do the same and allow a permanent work at home option, but with negative ramifications to pay. As for Apple, its retail stores have closed, re-opened, and closed again in response to fresh outbreaks local to each store location.
Google's decision may make others think twice about bringing back employees this year and may instead choose to run the work at home experiment for longer. Pichai is certainly using it as an opportunity to do so, commenting, "We are still learning a lot from our experiences of working from home and will use that knowledge to inform our approach to the future of work at Google."