LEAVE POLICY

GO AWRY

Even with a clear concept and good intentions, plans can go awry in the rapidly changing environment, as JPMorgan discovered.

JPMorgan had moved faster than most other US banks in implementing measures, such as restricting non-essential travel for its entire work force and asking staff to test remote access capability.

On Monday, it was prepared to go further by implementing a staggered work-from-home policy for roughly a third of its 127,137 consumer-unit employees who work from corporate offices across the country. But it put the plan on pause while leaders debated what would happen if implemented company-wide and how to communicate what could be a touchy issue given the branch employees and call-center operators, people familiar with the talks said earlier this week.

It wasn’t until New York state sought business help that the bank implemented on Thursday a staggered work-from-home plan for its New York-area employees.

Wells Fargo & Co., which also has thousands of branches, has been testing limited work-fromhome capabilities this week. Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs Group, Inc., BlackRock, Inc. and Citigroup, Inc. asked portions of their staff to work from home in rotating shifts.

Retail giant Costco Wholesale Corp., which is based in Issaquah, Washington, bucked the trend altogether, so far, telling headquarters workers to stay at their desks unless ill.

“We know some home office employees would like to work remotely, but our jobs here are to support our retail business, and we’re not prepared at this point to have corporate employees work from home,” the company told employees. “This decision may be unpopular with some, but we consider it a matter of equity and fairness.”

The growing awareness of the gap between workers has prompted some corporate adjustments for employees who can only work at work.

Walmart, Inc. announced a new emergency-leave policy for its hourly workers after a store employee tested positive for the coronavirus. The retailer will allow employees to stay home if they are unable to work or feel “uncomfortable” at work, according to a memo seen by Bloomberg. To be paid for the time, employees will still need to use regular paid time-off options, it said.

“What this is bringing to the fore is just how important these front-line service workers are to our service economy,” said Erin Hatton, the University of Buffalo professor. “And in my ideal vision, businesses would come out of this, as well as the government, with a better sense of ‘Wait, we need to take care of these workers because our economy is only as robust as these workers are protected.’” —