Employers who force staff to return to the office five days a week have been called the “dinosaurs of our age” by one of the world’s leading experts who coined the term “presenteeism.”
Sir Cary Cooper, a professor of organizational psychology and health at the University of Manchester’s Alliance Manchester Business School, said employers imposing strict requirements on staff to be in the office risked driving away talented workers, damaging the wellbeing of employees and undermining their financial performance.
It comes after Amazon said on Monday that all its corporate staff would be expected to work from the office five days a week from Jan. 2, as the latest big global employer to demand a strict return to pre-pandemic practices.
Photo: AP
“Unfortunately some organizations and companies are thinking of trying to force people back into the work environment five days a week. I think they’re the dinosaurs of our age. The old command and control type management style,” Cooper said.
“Amazon say they want people back five days a week, and a couple of investment banks. But that goes against the evidence,” he said.
Amazon did not respond to a request for comment.
“If you value and trust people to get on with their job, and give them autonomy — and flexible work is one of those — they’ll work better, you’ll retain them, and they will be less likely to have a stress-related illness.
“If you micromanage, you won’t get productivity gains, and you won’t attract the next generation.”
Widely regarded as one of the world’s leading authorities on workplace organization, health and wellbeing, Cooper coined the term presenteeism in the 1980s to describe when employees are at work but not performing to their full potential because of health issues.
He previously advised the government on work and wellbeing in the 2000s, producing research leading to an expansion in flexible working legislation under the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition in 2014.
Labor is preparing to unveil sweeping changes to workers’ rights legislation within weeks, including measures to make flexible working the default option for workers from day one on the job, alongside a ban on exploitative zero-hours contracts.
Some business leaders have expressed concerns about the scale of the changes, saying they could damage job creation and the economy. However, the business secretary, Jonathan Reynolds, told the Times on Monday that he wanted to end a “culture of presenteeism” that was holding back the economy.
“It does contribute to productivity, it does contribute to [staff] resilience, their ability to stay working for an employer,” he said.
Cooper said the “overwhelming evidence” was that flexible working created higher job satisfaction levels, better retention of staff and could help drive up workplace productivity.
“Reynolds is absolutely right,” he said. “Working longer doesn’t lead to productivity, but more ill health.”
Remote working boomed at the height of the COVID pandemic, leading some experts to predict a permanent shift in working practices. However, many firms have introduced return-to-office policies, which have since been tightened. Some, including Amazon, Boots and Goldman Sachs, have demanded employees return to a five-day, office-based working routine.
Andy Jassy, Amazon’s chief executive, wrote in a note sent to employees on Monday that the company believed that the “advantages of being together in the office are significant.”
However, Amazon applies different arrangements for warehouse operatives, where flexible part-time contracts and four-day working week arrangements are available.
Last month Amazon UK published the results of a survey it commissioned showing that half of all UK workers want more flexibility at work, with a majority of respondents saying a better work-life balance was the main reason.
In a press release highlighting Labor’s manifesto promises on flexible working, John Boumphrey, Amazon’s UK and Ireland country manager, said at the time that the company was “delighted” to offer flexible contracts to warehouse staff.
“These findings clearly demonstrate the huge importance of workplace flexibility, and why it matters so much to employees,” he said.
The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), and the country’s other political groups dare not offend religious groups, says Chen Lih-ming (陳立民), founder of the Taiwan Anti-Religion Alliance (台灣反宗教者聯盟). “It’s the same in other democracies, of course, but because political struggles in Taiwan are extraordinarily fierce, you’ll see candidates visiting several temples each day ahead of elections. That adds impetus to religion here,” says the retired college lecturer. In Japan’s most recent election, the Liberal Democratic Party lost many votes because of its ties to the Unification Church (“the Moonies”). Chen contrasts the progress made by anti-religion movements in
Taiwan doesn’t have a lot of railways, but its network has plenty of history. The government-owned entity that last year became the Taiwan Railway Corp (TRC) has been operating trains since 1891. During the 1895-1945 period of Japanese rule, the colonial government made huge investments in rail infrastructure. The northern port city of Keelung was connected to Kaohsiung in the south. New lines appeared in Pingtung, Yilan and the Hualien-Taitung region. Railway enthusiasts exploring Taiwan will find plenty to amuse themselves. Taipei will soon gain its second rail-themed museum. Elsewhere there’s a number of endearing branch lines and rolling-stock collections, some
Last week the State Department made several small changes to its Web information on Taiwan. First, it removed a statement saying that the US “does not support Taiwan independence.” The current statement now reads: “We oppose any unilateral changes to the status quo from either side. We expect cross-strait differences to be resolved by peaceful means, free from coercion, in a manner acceptable to the people on both sides of the Strait.” In 2022 the administration of Joe Biden also removed that verbiage, but after a month of pressure from the People’s Republic of China (PRC), reinstated it. The American
This was not supposed to be an election year. The local media is billing it as the “2025 great recall era” (2025大罷免時代) or the “2025 great recall wave” (2025大罷免潮), with many now just shortening it to “great recall.” As of this writing the number of campaigns that have submitted the requisite one percent of eligible voters signatures in legislative districts is 51 — 35 targeting Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus lawmakers and 16 targeting Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmakers. The pan-green side has more as they started earlier. Many recall campaigns are billing themselves as “Winter Bluebirds” after the “Bluebird Action”
RSS