GM’s Simple Message to Employees About Returning to Work: ‘Work the Right Way’

DETROIT – General Motors takes a surprisingly simple approach to its employee return to work strategy: “Work the Right Way.”

That’s the message delivered Tuesday by CEO Mary Barra and other GM leaders about how the automaker plans to reintegrate its 155,000 global workers into a post-vaccination work world. It is a flexible, evolving policy that executives say will vary by employee, week, and project.

It could mean remotely providing more training to GM’s 87,000 hourly factory workers who need to be in the company’s manufacturing facilities for their jobs. Or it could mean that a salaried worker can work permanently from home or run a hybrid schedule from the office and remotely.

“It’s not about a policy or a one-size-fits-all approach,” Laura Jones, GM’s global talent director, told reporters this week. “But really the evolution of our culture for everyone.”

The decision to set up such a program followed feedback from employees, many of whom have been working remotely for a year due to the coronavirus pandemic. GM conducted several studies on how and where employees would most prefer to work in the future, officials said.

GM’s remote work plan is a play on the company’s simplified dress code, which Barra initiated while leading human resources from 2009-2011. She replaced a ten-page dress code with two words: “Dress appropriately.”

Such flexible and ambiguous policies are designed to enable GM leaders to take responsibility for their departments and employees. GM recently held 52 workshops for 1,100 business leaders to flesh out its remote work initiative, officials said. Each leader works with their employees to determine an appropriate work schedule.

“The lessons and successes of the past year have led us to introduce how we will manage the future of work at GM, called ‘Work Appropriately.’ This means employees, where work permits, have the flexibility to work where they can have the greatest impact in achieving our goals, ”Barra said in a LinkedIn post on Tuesday.

GM declined to estimate how much it could save on office-related costs as a result of the new initiative. Executives also declined to predict how many employees were expected to remain at a distance. Jones said having such an estimate would “go against the philosophy” of the initiative.

GM’s strategy comes a month after Ford Motor said it will launch a hybrid work schedule that gives non-manufacturing workers more flexibility in reporting to the office.

GM believes its new policy, which it calls a “mindset,” will help recruit new employees, some of whom will not work in traditional GM locations.

Allowing such flexibility has already spurred recruitment during the coronavirus pandemic, said Cyril George, GM’s global talent acquisition director.

“From a recruiting perspective, it has opened up the talent pool for us significantly,” he said, calling it a “truly liberating aspect” for hiring.

George said the company will have hired more new employees in the US in the first quarter of 2021 than in all of 2020 and 2019 combined. About 20% of the 3,300 new job openings are completely remote, he said.

GM declined to provide an update on when employees working remotely due to the coronavirus pandemic will return to the office. The company previously confirmed a June or July target, but said it would be based on local regulations regarding Covid-19.

According to a company spokesperson, only about 25% of GM’s non-manufacturing employees worldwide work in physical locations.