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WPP, the advertising group, has told its more than 100,000 employees they will have to return to work in the office at least four days a week, the latest sign that employers are tightening work-from-home policies since the end of the pandemic.
In a letter sent to staff on Tuesday, WPP CEO Mark Read said that “since the beginning of April this year, expectations . . . it will be that most of us spend an average of four days a week in the office”.
He added that “WPP’s success still rests on the foundations of human connection, creativity and relationships,” and that “we do our best when we’re together live.”
Until now, individual WPP-owned agencies had their own hybrid working policies, but staff at group headquarters had to be in the office three days a week.
The news makes WPP, which employs around 110,000 people in offices around the world, the latest major global employer to ask its staff to return to the office more fully in the new year. From this month, Amazon told staff around the world that they should work in the office five days a week, and CEO Andy Jassy said the previous three-day-a-week workplace rule “reinforced our belief in the benefits” of being in the office.
In Great Britain, BT asked its 50,000 office workers will return to the office at least three days a week from the beginning of this year. Other UK employers tightening their rules on working from home this month include PwC, Santander and Asda, marking a broad shift in corporate attitudes to working since the end of the pandemic around the world.
WPP found that higher levels of office attendance were associated with stronger “employee engagement, improved client survey results and better financial performance,” Read said, adding: “More of our clients are moving in this direction and expect it from the teams that work with them .”
Employers now sometimes face new problems related to the lack of office space when they bring more staff from work from home.
WPP said it would “undertake detailed planning in the coming months to address capacity requirements and other related areas” across its global offices.
The UK-listed advertising group will soon open a new office at One Southwark Bridge Road in London, which will mainly house media agency GroupM and around 2,500 people. It was the previous headquarters of the Financial Times.
The new office will join Rose Court across the road and its corporate headquarters at nearby Sea Containers House as one of three office campuses in London, where it employs around 10,000 people.
In a New Year memo, Read also addressed the merger of two of its biggest rivals — IPG and Omnicom — announced last month, saying that “while industry mergers and struggles for status may distract our competitors, our focus will be paramount in 2025.”
