Goldman Sachs is clearly serious about its employees’ presence in office for five days a week. However, many are unwilling to give up the convenience and flexibility of remote and hybrid work that they had become used to during the pandemic. Also, there are several who were hired as remote workers during that time, lured by the flexibility, who may not be interested in working from office at all.
It is reported that many employees choose to stay away on Fridays, so that they can enjoy a long weekend. It is becoming a challenge for the Bank to get these employees to follow a five-day in-person work model.
While the Bank maintains that it is only trying to remind its staff that their attendance is required in office as per company policy, there are some people who point out that Goldman Sachs has more employees working from office than many other financial institutions. Yet, this has not really done much good for the Bank in terms of profits and performance in recent time. So, this push for a 5-day work-from-office does not really make much sense. If anything, it will only add to the frustration of the employees whose morale is already low.
The Bank has seen considerable job cuts in recent times amidst attempts to cut costs, tackle rising interest rates and inflation, and work towards sustainability and profitability.