Microsoft has announced that it was planning to fully re-open its Washingston state and Silicon Valley work sites on February 28, 2022. Chris Capossela, Executive Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer explained today that this is an important new chapter in the company’s hybrid workplace model that the company created and updated throughout the pandemic.

“For nearly two years, our hybrid workplace model has anchored each of our work sites to one of six defined stages, allowing us to quickly adjust our guidance depending on health data, local government guidance, the availability of vaccines and vaccination rates and other considerations. Based on this approach and improving local health metrics, our Washington state work sites will move to our sixth and final stage of the hybrid workplace model, effective Feb. 28, 2022,” the exec explained.

This sixth stage means that Microsoft can fully re-open its offices to employees, visitors, and guests starting February 28. “From this date, employees will have 30 days to make adjustments to their routines and adopt the working preferences they’ve agreed upon with their managers,” Capossela added.

In addition to Microsoft’s offices in Washington state, the company’s new Silicon Valley Campus and other Bay Area sites in California will also fully re-open on February 28. The company expects many of its other work sites in the US to follow depending on the evolution of COVID-19 cases and vaccination rates in these areas.

Like many other big tech companies, Microsoft made some early return to office plans at the beginning of the pandemic, but the Redmond giant had to delay those plans due to the uncertainty caused by the different COVID-19 variants. This led the company to significantly increase its investments in Microsoft Teams, which recently crossed 270 million monthly active users. “We’ve learned a lot about working remotely in the last two years and we’re fortunate to have the tools to continue doing so if needed,” explained Capossela.

Tagged with COVID-19