Leon Neal
Microsoft just set a new return-to-office mandate, and an internal document shows it’s rolling out an even stricter policy for employees who work within its Microsoft AI organization under the group’s CEO, Mustafa Suleyman.
Effective January 26, Microsoft AI employees who live within 25 or 50 miles of an office (depending on location) “are required to be in the office 4 days a week,” the document states.
The policy applies to those who:
- Live within 50 miles of an office in the Seattle area, Silicon Valley, San Francisco, New York, Chicago, or Los Angeles.
- Or live within 25 miles of a designated Microsoft AI office in China (Beijing, Shanghai, Suzhou), India (Bangalore, Hyderabad, Noida), Taiwan (Taipei), Egypt (Cairo), Ireland (Dublin), Serbia (Belgrade), Switzerland (Zurich), United Kingdom (London), or Canada (Vancouver).
Any exception must be approved by an executive who reports to Suleyman directly, according to the document.
Microsoft on Tuesday notified employees via an internal email from HR chief Amy Coleman that the company is mandating employees to work from offices at least three days a week. That email, viewed by Business Insider, stated, “Each business will do what is best for their team, which means some groups will deviate from our company-wide expectations.”
The new mandate for the AI organization comes as Microsoft tries to become more competitive in luring AI talent amid the talent wars with OpenAI, Meta, Google, and others. Suleyman’s organization has a special recruiting team to handle competitive offers, and the company is trying to poach AI engineers and researchers with multimillion-dollar pay packages from its AI rivals.
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