CEO enforces in-person work policy, refusing to pay for relocation of remote hires, sparks mass quitting: 'There was a veritable flurry of resignations'

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Ben Weiss • Writer and Editor
Mar 6, 2025 4:00 PM EST

Isn't it amusing when management fails to uphold their end of the bargain? It's far too common for bosses and managers to stress how crucial it is for their employees to follow the rules as written in their contract upon hiring, and yet they seem to forget that a contract is a negotiation between two parties. 

These unequal dynamics have become all the more apparent over the last several years, especially when it comes to in-person vs. remote work. Return-to-work transitions need to be carefully applied, especially when some employees were expressly told that they were fully remote hires. Keep scrolling below to see how this CEO completely dropped the ball when it came to enforcing his new in-person work policy.

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    "If you want to work from home, go work somewhere else"
    via Unsplash+ (Getty Images)

    The image does not depict the actual subjects of the story. Subjects are models.

  • Imagine what would happen if your boss enforced a new return-to-work policy despite the fact that most of their hires over the last several years were not only told that it would be fully remote but they also lived in completely different cities. To make matters worse, the CEO showed no sympathy during scheduled town halls and asked for employees living outside cities with their offices to come up with a one-year plan to relocate their families. And just when you thought it couldn't get worse… the company had no intention of paying for this relocation.

  • 02
    For a short while last year, I worked as a team lead for one of the app development teams for one of the food delivery apps. The
    via Icerman
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    entire team had been working from home since the start of the and had had a bunch of remote-only people join, so they were spread across several time zones, but we made it work because we thought this was how things were going to be going forward.
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    After making several billion dollars from people like us working from home and ordering delivery, around the end of summer, the entire C-suite decided that was pretty much over (spoiler: it definitely wasn't and all my people
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    knew it) and that we would all be heading back to the office part time, gradually increasing to full time. Now, this place had pretty high turnover, so most of us had never been to any of the offices
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    since we had been hired. We had been told when we were hired that any return to work policy would be super flexible and it turned out it really wasn't. Moreover, those in cities without an office, even
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    though they were hired as remote workers, were expected to come up with a 1-year plan about how they were going to move without any assistance or compensation to a city with an office.
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    Needless to say, my team and many others lost their collective over this new policy. So the CEO started doing town halls with the other executives to pump the "collaboration" and "team- building" aspects of being back in the office. During one of the Q&A
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    sessions, someone finally asked something like "I was hired remote and I don't live in a city with an office. I don't want to uproot my family. Will you make exceptions for people like me?". To which the
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    CEO replied "Look. This is what we're doing and what we think is best for the company. If you want to work from home, my suggestion is to go work somewhere else".
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    What happened next was the digital equivalent of the air being let out of a balloon. The company slack channel conversations ground to a halt and became virtual ghost towns, going from spirited conversations to the bare minimum of functional courtesies.
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    The attendance at company-wide meetings fell by half and within a month, there was a veritable flurry of resignations, including mine.
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    Prior to this debacle, we had already been paid below market rates, so this You from the CEO was just the match being lit on an already pretty sizable tank of gas.
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    By the time I left, the team that started at 8 people was down to just 2 deciding to stay. And six months later, word is they are still trying to find people and resorting to making QA people into app developers just to try to keep things going. As for me - I got a
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    50% pay bump for less responsibilities and work just a few hours a day instead of tons of unpaid overtime trying to put out fires at that old
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    Cheezburger Image 10476367872
    via Unsplash+ (Getty Images)

    The image does not depict the actual subjects of the story. Subjects are models.

  • Several employees of other companies shared their similar experiences when their return-to-work policies started to be enforced. The truth of the matter is that once employees get the sense that fully remote work is better for virtually everyone, it's pretty hard to go back!

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    MatthewCrawley "If you won't let your employees work from home, someone else will."
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    Just_an_Empath I don't understand why corporations won't jump on the fact that they wouldn't have to rent offices anymore. That's a lot of extra cash for their yachts.
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    Not just renting itself but all the maintenance and IT guys. Cleaning crew, etc. ???
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    sgt_bad_phart. While the CEO's "work elsewhere" comment is what broke the camels back, the first mistake was setting an expectation that employees in cities without offices were to establish a 1-year relocation plan without assistance.
    via Icerman
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    So you hire me, tell me remote work is all good, then backpedal and tell me I have to relocate. Its your stupid policy so its your stupid responsibility to help your employees do that. Honestly, is that anything other than bait- and-switch?
    via Icerman
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    Hobbit Feet45. Could you name the app? Due to certain circumstances, I'm immunosuppressed and losing disability I'm being forced to drive for one of these food service apps, I don't want to work for a one that treats it's workers badly.
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    motoguzzikc I'm a software QA and you DO NOT want me coding anything
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    [deleted] The WFH pandoras box has been opened and there is no closing it. Companies that want to attract the best talent will at least have to offer hybrid working.
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  • 25
    turkeyfan0 A smart CEO that went into an empty office would see this as an opportunity and size down the office so that they would pay less rent and other costs like water/electricity/mainta nce etc.
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    An old boomer CEO that went into an empty office saw that as a threat because he didn't have a chance to boss anyone around.
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workplace-stories work stories toxic-workplace job work ceo satisfying quitting story toxic-boss Horrible Bosses bad bosses company quitting toxic-work-environment
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