‘It's just a different world now': Dropbox CEO Drew Houston slams return-to-office mandates
In a sharp rebuke of corporate return-to-office policies, Dropbox CEO Drew Houston likened the push to bring employees back into physical workspaces to reviving outdated institutions.
'Forcing people back to the office is probably going to be like trying to force people back into malls and movie theaters,' Houston said during an episode of Fortune's Leadership Next podcast on Wednesday. 'Nothing wrong with the movie theater, but it's just a different world now.'
JPMorgan, in particular, has faced criticism from employees after CEO Jamie Dimon insisted on a five-day office week, dismissing remote work as ineffective for collaboration and mentorship.
'You can't learn working from your basement,' Dimon said in a recent Bloomberg interview.
'We can be a lot less dumb than forcing people back into a car three days a week or whatever, to literally be back on the same Zoom meeting they would have been at home,' he said. 'There's a better way to do this.'
Nearly half of employees who work from home at least occasionally say they'd be unlikely to stay in their current job if remote work were eliminated, according to a recent Pew Research Center survey.
Dropbox pivoted to a 'virtual first' model in 2020, and now operates under a 90/10 model — employees work remotely 90% of the time, with the remainder reserved for periodic in-person gatherings.
Houston emphasized the need to evolve remote work strategies beyond the early pandemic's reactive model.
'Version two, version three of this is going to be a lot better than the version point-five that we had in the pandemic,' he said.
'If you trust people and treat them like adults, they'll behave like adults,' he told Fortune in 2023. 'Trust over surveillance.'
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