Broadcom CEO Hock Tan was unsparing in his expectations about remote work during a meeting with his new employees.

Broadcom is laying off 1,267 Palo Alto-based VMware workers following its acquisition of the company

Chip manufacturer Broadcom wrote the latest chapter in the long story of return-to-office tensions between bosses and employees.

After completing its $69 billion acquisition of cloud computing company VMWare, Broadcom CEO Hock Tan issued a direct order to his new employees about where they must work. “If you live within 50 miles of an office, you get your butt in here,” he told the workers of previously remote-friendly VMWare.

The comments came during a meeting Tan hosted on Tuesday after the merger between the two companies officially closed, following approval from Chinese regulators. Like many other executives, Tan cited in-person work’s benefits to collaboration and company culture. “Collaboration is important and a key part of sustaining a culture with your peers, with your colleagues,” he said.

  • tjhart85
    6•1 year ago

    I’ve got a 20 mile commute and that’s basically at the edge of what I’d be willing to do on a daily basis at this point. Sure 50 miles is fine once a week or whatever, but fuck if I’m putting in anything more than 39.9999999 hours if you’re expecting me to spend 2+ hours commuting every day (and 2 hours is basically assuming best case highway all the way scenario to come up with it only being 2 hours)!

    I know this is the norm for a lot of people, but I’d have to be very desperate to do it again and people that were 100% WFH or worse yet hired to be WFH aren’t going to be willing to do it for long.