Apple employees protest after Tim Cook asks them to come to office 3 days a week

As COVID-19 cases have dropped significantly, companies are asking their employees to return to office at least for a few days a week. One of these companies is the Cupertino-based Apple. CEO Tim Cook recently asked employees to work from office at least 3 days a week starting next month. And, this is clearly not something that Apple staffers are in support of. In fact, AppleTogether, which represents current Apple workers, has launched a petition asking for a more flexible working environment.

In the petition, as reported by WSJ, the AppleTogether group requested the tech giant to let employees decide their own work arrangements with their managers. The petition reportedly had more than 270 signatures as of Monday afternoon, which is just about a fraction of the global workforce. As per the company website, Apple has more than 1,65,000 employees in total.

Apple employees stated several reasons why requesting flexible work arrangements. Some of them included issues related to disabilities, health problems, and also the fact that some of them are “happier” and “more productive” in the flexible work environment. “For the past 2+ years, Apple’s formerly office-based employees have performed exceptional work, flexibly, both outside and inside traditional office environments,” the petition noted.

Apple’s most recent quarterly results were slightly better

Notably, Apple’s most recent quarterly results were slightly better than expected despite high inflation and other economic pressures. And the company reported that its iPhone sales continued to grow.

Well, like several other tech companies, the Apple CEO decided to call employees back to office many times but the pandemic pushed the plan. Finally, when Cook wants everyone to return to office at least 3 days a week, employees aren’t very happy with the decision. Tech companies have been making constant efforts to get employees back to office, but things haven’t really worked in their favour just yet. Google and Microsoft have asked their employees to work from office for at least part of the week. Again, there are companies like Tesla and SpaceX that have imposed stricter rules and asked employees to work from office at least 40 hours a week.