Twitter will resume business travel and open up its offices all around the world on March 15th, according to a tweet by Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal. While some Twitter staff began working out of the company’s San Francisco and New York City offices last fall, most offices have remained closed since the beginning of the pandemic. But unlike many companies who are returning to in-person operations, Twitter is not requiring employees to come back. Early into the pandemic, Twitter granted employees the option of working from home indefinitely.
Agrawal noted that a workforce where a large fraction will either be 100 percent remote or switching between the office and home will have its unique challenges. “In 2020 we adjusted quickly to working virtually with resilience and agility, but almost all of us were working from home. Distributed working will be much, much harder. Anyone who has joined a meeting remotely while others are in a conference room knows this pain. There will be lots of challenges in the coming months, and we’ll need to be proactive, intentional, learn and adapt,” wrote Agrawal.
Both Twitter and Slack have adopted “work from home forever” policies during the pandemic, but other tech companies are being more strict. Facebook employees have the option to request to work from home permanently, but some roles are not eligible for this privilege. Google is mandating that all employees return to work by April 4th for at least three days a week, though employees can request extensions or apply to work from home permanently.
