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Amazon is blocking promotions of employees who don't comply with its return-to-office policy, leaked documents show
(www.businessinsider.com)
this post was submitted on 15 Nov 2023
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I didn't think promotions are contractually obligated usually. As in you're not guaranteed a promotion and it's not written into your contract. So if Amazon, or any other company, wants to change the expectations for a promotion then as long as it is clearly communicated and given time to be adopted I don't see a problem if they want people to work on site. Especially if working from home is, also, not part of your contract.
You don't have to work for Amazon if you disagree. Find a, much better, job elsewhere.
That's the idea. It's illegal for Amazon to fire people for not wanting to return on-site, so they do the legally allowed minimum to condition promotions based on that. Legal, but still shitty. They hired a ton of remote (by contract) workers during the pandemic and made a shit ton of profit, now they don't know how to get rid of them without a severance package.
Employment laws are state-by-state, but I don't know a single one where it's illegal to fire someone for not coming into the office.
Here is the jist. They can fire you for not going to the office, but they have to fire everybody else who doesn't go, else there they (the employee) can argue discrimination. And if we are taking a few hundreds of lawsuits, plus all the union movement they are having...
So it's better to "gently" let the people know they are not welcomed and motivate them to go.
Tl;Dr: Apes, together, strong.
Do you have experience with employment law?
An employee could argue discrimination, but they'd have to have evidence that it was due to a protected class to have any success, and those cases are notoriously hard to prove. In every state that I'm aware of, they can fire people selectively for not coming into the office, while keeping others employed.
It will be up to the judge on each case to decide, I'm sure that we could see different rulings for very similar cases.
Ultimately wether they win or lose they don't want to stir the flames, else they would have already done what you said. If it was so black and white, the penalty wouldn't be "blocking promotions".
Sure, Amazon doesn't want hundreds of extra lawsuits, but the staff also don't want to waste their money on legal fees for a suit that's a guaranteed loss. Case law is very well-established.
What's with the assumption that it's the law that is keeping Amazon from mass-firing staff who won't come in?
The approach they're taking is just a smart business decision. It allows them to spread the disruptions out so they're more manageable, to keep employees who's skills justify flexibility in the WFH rules, and prevents the PR impact of a mass termination.