Post the COVID-19 pandemic, the workplace is never going to be the same again. Almost all organisations will adapt to the new normal, where a substantial portion of the employees will be working from home. Google Inc, the largest global tech giant, is making those changes with employees likely to be working from home for the next two months at least, reports Bloomberg.
This came in a mail the company’s CEO Sundar Pichai addressed to all the employees. The crux of his message is that even if the lockdown restrictions are lifted, Google will continue to follow the WFH and there will be an gradual return to office for them.
Pichai has recalled how Google was one of the companies that decided to stop staff from coming to the Mountain View headquarters and work from their home. The Bay Area where the office is located is one of the first ones in the US to clamp the lockdown and now this has been extended till May 31.
The Google CEO’s mail is addressing the situation beyond May 31. He has said the way the people are used to working at the Google complex will have to be revisited. He may be referring to social distancing among other things plus a whole lot of precautions being advised by experts to stay away from getting infected by the Coronavirus.
These include the way the lifts are operated in the buildings, the way the office equipment needs to be repeatedly sanitized and even the doorknobs to be carefully handled. All these are not going to be easy. Though Sundar Pichai has not referred to these things, he has expressed as much by saying life after COVID will be different and that this experience has given the opportunity to reimagine how they work.
Observers are of the opinion that the Google employees were used to free meals in their offices, apart from the endless cups of coffee they could consume. WFH has changed all that.