Ride-hailing giant says most remote employees must return to offices as it reduces management layers and reorganises teams around key hubs……
Uber is sharply scaling back its work-from-home arrangement, with only about one per cent of its workforce expected to remain fully remote as the ride-hailing company embarks on a major restructuring that will eliminate about 3,300 jobs.
The new policy was announced by Uber Chief Executive Officer, Dara Khosrowshahi, in a memo to employees published on the company’s website.
Under the new arrangement, most employees who currently work entirely remotely will be required to relocate to an office, although Uber will retain a hybrid model that requires staff to work from the office three days a week.
“We are also asking the vast majority of remote employees to move to an office, and going forward, only 1% of employees will be remote,” Khosrowshahi said.
Uber has not revealed the number of employees currently working fully remotely, making it unclear how many staff members will be affected by the change.
Khosrowshahi said the decision followed the company’s experience with in-person collaboration, which he said had produced clear benefits in teamwork, problem-solving and the development of employees at the early stages of their careers.
“The benefits of sitting together, collaborating in person, and solving problems as a team are clearer than ever in our post-COVID world,” he stated.
The company is also introducing a more defined structure for determining where employees and teams should be located, with a greater concentration of staff in selected hubs.
Global teams will be based mainly in major centres such as New York and San Francisco, while regional and local teams will operate from designated regional and country hubs. Technology staff will be concentrated in technology hubs.
Uber said it would also seek to place managers and their teams in the same locations wherever practical, with particular emphasis on employees in the early stages of their careers.
The return-to-office push comes alongside Uber’s largest workforce reduction since the COVID-19 pandemic, with approximately 3,300 positions expected to be eliminated.
The job cuts form part of a wider effort to simplify the company’s structure, reduce management layers and address what management considers excessive organisational complexity.
According to Khosrowshahi, Uber’s significant growth over the past five years has resulted in additional layers of management, more coordination requirements and fragmented responsibility across parts of the business.
The restructuring is expected to shrink Uber’s management ranks by around 20 per cent and reduce the number of so-called micro-teams units led by managers with only one or two direct reports by about half.
The changes come as Uber continues to reshape its global operations.
In Nigeria, the company ended its ride-hailing operations in September after roughly 12 years in the market. The exit followed changes in the local operating environment and increasing competition from other mobility platforms.
Uber had launched its Nigerian operations in Lagos in 2014 before expanding to other cities across the country.
Its departure has left Bolt and other ride-hailing companies competing for drivers and passengers in a market that expanded considerably following Uber’s entry.
