The drum beat of companies requiring employees to return to the office continues as Dell tells all its employees, even those more than an hour away, that they have to work at an office at least 39 days a quarter (approximately 3 days per week) saying that it is necessary to “drive innovation and value differentiation.”

After Championing Remote Work, Dell Calls Employees Back to the Office

By Katie Burke

After years of encouraging remote work, Dell Technologies is joining a chorus of global tech giants in their push to get employees to return to physical offices.

The Round Rock, Texas-based company told some of its employees that they must show up to a corporate hub at least 39 days a quarter, a mandate that shakes out to roughly three days a week, a Dell spokesperson confirmed to CoStar News. The new in-person requirement will apply to workers who have been operating on a hybrid policy, which the computer hardware company has gradually revised over the past couple of years.

“We believe in-person connections paired with a flexible approach are critical to drive innovation and value differentiation,” the Dell spokesperson said in a statement.

The revised policy marks a sharp turn for Dell, which had previously said about two-thirds of its workforce could continue working from home until the pandemic ended, and even then would only be required to show up to an office for one or two days per week. Starting last year, however, the company began walking that leniency back with a previous mandate requiring all employees living within an hour of a Dell office to come in at least three days per week.

Now, that has been widened to include all employees, regardless of where they live or how long it will take for them to commute to a physical workspace.

The move underscores employers’ growing confidence in their ability to enforce stricter rules surrounding in-person requirements, a shift widely expected to help boost daily attendance rates at office properties that have been sitting largely vacant since the early days of the pandemic. The tech giant joins other companies such as IBM, Kroger, Amazon and AT&T in stepping up in-person requirements that go as far as asking workers to relocate in order to live closer to an office.

Dell, which employs more than 125,000 workers, occupies about 9.5 million square feet of office space around the world, according to CoStar data.