Ford Eyes a Hybrid Work Future, Lets 86,000 Global Employees Work From Home

Ford has become the first automotive giant to embrace a permanent shift to hybrid work- enabling its 86,000-strong global corporate workforce to work from home permanently and only come to work to attend meetings, workshops, or team-building activities.

Automotive giant Ford has announced permanent and flexible remote work for around 86,000 global and 30,000 U.S. workers from July onwards, paving the way for corporate workers to permanently work from home and come to work only to attend meetings and workshops or team-building activities.

“The nature of work drives whether or not you can adopt this model. There are certain jobs that are place-dependent — you need to be in the physical space to do the job,” said David Dubensky, chairman and CEO of Ford Motor Land Development Corporation. “Having the flexibility to choose how you work is pretty powerful. … It’s up to the employee to have dialogue and discussion with their people leader to determine what works best.” 

The new policy will be effective for office workers only. Most of Ford’s 100,000 factory workers have already reported back to work to help the company cope with pandemic-affected backlogs. At present, Ford Motors does not have a mandatory vaccination policy for employees returning to work, but it plans to educate employees about safety standards and vaccinations. The carmaker has also implemented several safety measures at its factories and offices, requiring regular temperature checks, symptoms surveys, contact tracing, and more to stop the virus’s spread. 

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Before announcing the new hybrid work policy, Ford conducted several employee surveys to understand their temperament towards rejoining the office, the challenges they faced working from home, and overall emotional well-being. In a study conducted in June last year, 95% of the company’s employees said they preferred a blend of hybrid forms of working, including on-premise and remote work. A sizable number of employees also said they were happier and more productive working from home. 

Kiersten Robinson, chief people, and employee experience officer at Ford, told CNBC, “The nature of the work we do really is going to be a guiding element. If there’s one thing we’ve learned over the last 12 months, it is that a lot of our assumptions around work and what employees need has shifted.”

The recent PwC U.S. Remote Work SurveyOpens a new window has also revealed that the shift to remote work has been a success for a vast majority of U.S. companies, as attested by 83% of employers and 71% of employees. Of the 133 executives PwC surveyed, 55% preferred continued work from home, while 26% preferred employees coming back to office but only when required.

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With this announcement, Ford has become the first automobile company to permanently shift towards remote work, allowing about 86,000 employees globally to work partially from home. Ford says the move will give its employees the option of a better work-life balance, flexibility as caretakers and help them save time commuting between office and home.  

Soon after Ford’s announcement, General Motors sent an email to The Washington Post, saying that it expects to bring its remote employees back to their desks by June or July. “Although we have not announced a plan to employees yet, it will likely be more flexible based on a person’s responsibilities,” a spokesperson said. 

Japanese automaker Toyota also expects its Plano, Texas employees to work from home until at least June of this year. “We continue to monitor the situation in the DFW area including consulting with local health and elected officials, as well as other companies to see how they’re managing through this experience and will continue to base our decisions on science,” a Toyota spokesperson said.

Meanwhile, major companies including Google, Spotify, and Salesforce have announced their plans to offer their employees the option to permanently work from home. Several tech biggies like SalesForce, Amazon, Facebook, and others have also developed their versions of hybrid work models.

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