Trump’s RTO edict raises concerns over morale, efficiency — and burnout

President Donald J. Trump’s executive order to federal employees to return to the office “as soon as practicable” will have a variety of repercussions — most of them negative, according to industry analysts and others.

The return-to-office (RTO) policy issued last week signals Trump’s intent to fulfill campaign promises to reform the 2.3-million-strong federal workforce, which he has criticized as inefficient and bloated. The language in Trump’s order doesn’t clarify whether it applies only to the estimated 10% of federal civilian workers — about 228,000 as of May 2024 — who work remotely full-time, according to the Office of Management and Budget.

Trump may be upping the stakes, but then-President Joseph R. Biden Jr. signed legislation Jan. 5 designed to bring more federal employees back to the office and increase the efficiency of office space utilization. Both men were likely taking cues from various businesses that have instituted RTO mandates in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.

In 2022, Tesla and SpaceX chief executive CEO Elon Musk — now a close advisor to Trump — delivered an RTO ultimatum to his two companies’ white-collar workers: get back in the corporate office or face firing. Musk’s letter to executive staff at the time specified: “The office must be where your actual colleagues are located, not some remote pseudo-office. If you don’t show up, we will assume you have resigned.”

Other corporations have followed suit more recently. In December, Amazon and AT&T ended their work-from-home policies. AT&T went so far as to tell 9,000 of its 149,000 workers to relocate to an office area or be fired.

Peter Miscovich, managing director at global real estate firm JLL, said the US is entering a “hybrid winter,” as many CEOs impose RTO mandates that could pose talent attraction and retention challenges for leading IT organizations. That’s especially true for advanced tech leadership teams and IT departments that have built sophisticated hybrid work practices over time and invested significantly in hybrid operational technologies and related infrastructure across global organizations, he said.

“Perhaps the most significant risk associated with RTO mandates is the potential loss of valuable and critical IT digital talent,” Miscovich said. “The IT tech sector has embraced hybrid work more thoroughly than most industries, and IT professionals now view hybrid workplace flexibility as a standard expectation for the workforce rather than a perk.”

Over the past two or so years, remote work — once praised as the new paradigm for productivity and employee satisfaction — began losing some of its luster as more organizations required workers to get back to their cubicles, at least part time.

In fact, many organizations are already struggling to fill a significant IT talent gap. In some cases, generative artificial intelligence (genAI) has been able to replace needed workers; in most other instances, the dearth of tech talent remains.

Mandates can exacerbate employee churn

According to new research from the University of Pittsburgh, S&P 500 companies that rolled out RTO mandates experienced “abnormally high” employee turnover and longer time-to-hire when filling job vacancies. “This significant IT digital talent brain-drain risk is particularly acute given the current competitive market for technology talent,” Miscovich said.

In 2025, CIOs and senior IT leaders face growing challenges when trying to attract top talent while maintaining operational excellence and managing workplace transformation amid RTO mandates, according to Miscovich. Resistance to the mandates is especially strong in global IT departments where hybrid and remote work are deeply integrated and have proven highly effective.

John Veitch, dean of the School of Business and Management at Notre Dame de Namur in Belmont, California, said RTO mandates are “generally” a sign of insecure leadership. In other words, executives don’t trust what they can’t see. RTO mandates say, “I have to see people working and earning their living,” he said.

Veitch didn’t have strong feelings either way about RTOs involving the federal government workers, though from a workflow point of view, he said he’s not convinced there are benefits.

He agreed that with the tech marketplace unemployment rate near historic lows, it could push some workers out the door, he said. “I don’t think the federal government pays particularly well relative to what you can get if you’re a top-flight technologist at a Silicon Valley firm,” Veitch said. “Obviously, people who have options will choose those options, particularly if return-to-office is a deal breaker for them. So, I don’t think it’s going to help the government in any way, shape or form to retain talented people.”

Further research points to other problems with RTO mandates. Being in the office five days a week leads to higher rates of burnout, lower morale, and inefficiencies associated with commuting time, according to J. P. Gownder, a principal analyst at Forrester Research.

On average, US workers spend 2.3 days in the office each week, according to a Stanford University study. A separate Stanford study found that hybrid work had zero effect on workers’ productivity or career advancement and dramatically boosted retention rates.

In general, hybrid working arrangements hold numerous advantages over full-time, in-office, Gownder said, and for non-collaborative work, home offices are far better suited because they create “a focused environment.”

“Despite some managers’ concerns, employees who work in hybrid fashion are more productive than those who spend all their time in the office. Most employees engage in a mix of personal and collaborative work,” he said.

In fact, hybrid work boosts employee productivity, performance, and retention, according to Nicholas Bloom, a professor of economics at Stanford. Because of RTO mandates, employees are often forced to commute in only to do tasks they could handle at home. Even in the office, many still rely on videoconferencing to collaborate with colleagues in other locations.

As a result of that and other inconveniences, organizations that move from hybrid work to full-time in-office work can expect higher attrition rates, Gownder argued. “Sometimes, managers impose these policies specifically to drive higher attrition, in lieu of layoffs,” he said. “IT talent often can work effectively remotely, and attrition rates in general are higher among IT professionals.”

Too many workers, too few offices?

Additionally, the federal government and private companies have a dramatically smaller number of offices to which they could return as many companies have consolidated their footprints to a few key hubs. AT&T, for example, ordered 60,000 managers to work from one of only nine offices, forcing 9,000 employees to relocate or resign.

As the pandemic eased in 2022 and 2023, US core business centers in large and small cities continued to suffer the after-effects of remote- and hybrid-work policies, which led to a 20% to 40% reduction in office space use and a devaluation of properties. The big switch to remote work left many downtowns largely empty for months.

Data indicates that approximately 80% of offices had downsized by the end of 2023. Other sources indicate the downsizing slowed last year and by Q4 2024 office leasing rates were at about 92% of pre-pandemic levels, according to David Brodeur-Johnson, employee experience research lead at Forrester Research.

“And yes, I believe that firms would be willing to expand their office spaces as needed to keep up with capacity, but most aren’t there yet,” he said.

While most organizations adopted a hybrid-work policies, requiring employees to be in the office a few days each week while allowing work from home on other days, the Trump Administration’s policies are a strict, five-day RTO. That’s likely to incur an employee backlash, Brodeur-Johnson said.

The dangers of disengagement

The federal government, he said, risks employee disengagement more than attrition. Monitoring federal employee surveys like FedRamp will be crucial, as disengagement is costly for both employees and employers.

“It’s important to bear in mind also that autonomy is a primary source of intrinsic motivation — the kind that comes from within — so I would argue strongly that the biggest negative impact will likely be to employee engagement instead of attrition,” Brodeur-Johnson said.

Academic studies also show that strong social relationships are key to remote work success, with emotional closeness outweighing physical distance. But simply being in the office doesn’t promote social relationships, Brodeur-Johnson pointed out. “Which is why companies like Nvidia have left it up to employees to decide, up to and including fully remote work,” he said. “How close people feel to each other emotionally is far more important than physical distance.”

While Trump’s executive order could spark a wider look at RTO edicts elsewhere, most private companies have settled on what their employees will tolerate. Meanwhile, federal agencies have steadily increased in-office requirements, so the latest change shouldn’t be a surprise, Brodeur-Johnson said.

But for some workers — especially those with care-giving duties or better flexible job options — it could be the tipping point. Top talent might leave first, which is why RTO mandates have slowed recently, he said.