March 20, 2025

The office is back, baby, and your boss knows it. That's the underlying news in Andrew Rice's richly reported breakdown of the state of return-to-office policies. If there was a brief moment during the pandemic era when we thought the flexible office was the new normal, a rash of recent announcements has put an end to that expectation. Bosses across industries are telling employees to swipe in or leave, and some have upped the surveillance to make sure workers are cooperating. But good luck jockeying for a desk. What hasn't come back, evidently, is the office space to support all those returns. So it's elbow to elbow at places like Condé Nast and WPP, where employees are griping about the new conditions. 
—Genevieve Smith, executive editor, New York

By Andrew Rice

Photo: Casey Steffens

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