By Molly Miller
I was stunned to read last week that telecommunications behemoth AT&T was rescinding teleworking for some employees, with estimates that as many as 12,000 remote workers would be required to now commute to a physical corporate office for the daily grind.
What could possibly be the logic here?
Not consistency with their corporate mission. AT&T’s business is telecommunications, so cutting back on remote access is the wrong example for AT&T to show its corporate customers.
Not cost savings or productivity. “AT&T was able to slash its annual real estate costs by $30 million and gained $150 million in extra hours of productive work from teleworkers, the company told Network World in 2005.”
Not political correctness. AT&T’s decision flies in the face of the global imperative to conserve energy and reduce greenhouse gases.
Not effective personnel management. If the only way you can get people to be productive is stand over and watch them, those people are not right for the organization.
Definitely not good PR. Disgruntled employees are already talking about the plans to the media, which is not the kind of publicity AT&T wants. Some on the blogosphere suggest AT&T made the move to get folks to quit, rather than laying them off with severance pay. If that’s the case, my guess is the negative publicity could cost the company more than any potential “savings” on severance benefits.
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