Nothing CEO Carl Pei has a harsh wake-up call for his employees working from home, causing controversy on social media.
In a message posted on LinkedIn on August 19, the CEO announced that the company was not reaching its full potential and would therefore require its employees to work five days a week from the company’s London headquarters, ending teleworking entirely.
“With 567% year-on-year growth, we are the fastest growing smartphone brand in India. Yet we are at 0.1% of our potential,” Pei said in the message.
Pei acknowledged that the decision was controversial and “may not be suitable for everyone,” but stressed that the company was for “adults.”
“Remote work is not compatible with high ambition and high speed,” Pei said. “Some may worry about flexibility, but that’s no different than before COVID. This is a grown-up company, so if you need to be out of the office for business reasons, we trust you’re making the right decision.”
He also said the company is stopping teleworking for three specific reasons: collaboration, creativity and ambition.
OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei speaks onstage during TechCrunch Disrupt San Francisco 2019 at the Moscone Convention Center on October 4, 2019 in San Francisco, California.
Steve Jennings/Getty Images
“First of all, we make physical products where design, engineering, manufacturing and quality must work closely together to deliver the products to our users. This doesn’t work well remotely. Second, creativity and innovation are key to winning against larger companies. Not just in products, we also have to solve difficult problems and do more than the competition in all areas of our business with much fewer resources. This doesn’t work well remotely. And finally, our ambitions are different from many comparable companies that were founded at the same time. We don’t want to build a good company that gets acquired by a big company, but we want to realize our full potential to become a generation-defining company,” Pei said in the post.
The new policy for Nothing employees will take effect in two months, and Pei encourages employees who have a problem with the new policy to look for a new job.
“We know this is not the right concept for everyone, and that’s OK. We should look for a mutual fit,” Pei said. “You should find an environment where you feel comfortable, and we need to find people who want to stick with us to the end in the decades to come.”
The post has so far garnered widespread attention on LinkedIn, generating hundreds of comments and thousands of reactions, with some people expressing disappointment at the CEO’s aversion to remote work.
“‘This is a company for adults’ implies that remote work is for children or some kind of overgrown teenager. I hope this is the last time I hear from this company,” wrote one Linkedin user in the comments section below the post.
“You could have simply shortened this letter to: ‘We need to make layoffs but are trying to avoid severance packages.’ Honesty is the best policy, my friend!” wrote another Linkedin user.
“Another power-hungry CEO who doesn’t trust his employees when he can’t see them in person at the office. Say goodbye to all your talented employees who have obligations outside of work that don’t allow them to work five days in the office,” said another user.
More work:
Remote work has been a hot topic lately. Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt sparked outrage last week when, during a lecture at Stanford University, he blamed remote work for Google’s lag and problems in developing artificial intelligence.
While more and more executives claim that telecommuting is hurting productivity, many workers across the country disagree. According to a recent USA Today survey, only 16% of employees said they were more productive in the office, compared to 46% who said they were more productive from home.
