Editor’s note: This article was first published in March 2013, just after Yahoo’s work-from-home ban. Roles and figures are from that time, including Larry Ellison as Oracle CEO, Jeff Weiner as LinkedIn CEO, Retrofit’s 50 employees and 11 million in venture capital, and Matt Drudge’s earnings of over $1 million a year.
Ever since Marissa Mayer banned working from home at Yahoo, considering it ineffective, many people have criticised the decision. Not just Yahoo’s own employees, but also people who have built very successful careers working from home. Let’s begin:
1. Richard Branson, Virgin Group
Billionaire Richard Branson was the first to criticise the decision, writing on his own blog that he has never worked in an office environment and never will. Mr Branson believes Marissa Mayer has taken a giant step backwards. As he explained, Virgin likes to give its people the freedom to work wherever they want, confident that they have the strength of character and the experience to perform well whether they are in an office or in their own kitchen at home.
2. James Hamilton, Amazon
Amazon’s star engineer, James Hamilton, is the person ultimately responsible for keeping Amazon running. And where does Hamilton work from? Usually from a boat or from Hawaii. Four years ago, Hamilton and his wife sold their house and car to lead a nomadic life, which they spend mostly on a boat. When the boat docks near Amazon, Hamilton often hops on his bike and pays the company a visit. If Hamilton hadn’t been able to work this way, he probably wouldn’t work at Amazon, and so there’s a chance that Amazon wouldn’t be the company it is today.
3. Jeff Hyman, CEO of Retrofit
Jeff Hyman is the CEO of Retrofit, a personal training and weight-loss company that has raised 11 million in venture capital and has 50 employees, who spend 80% of their time working at home and 20% in the office.
Hyman says he has finally concluded that it’s better not to have offices (it saves a lot of money), since working from home is perfectly viable while still keeping quality control and consistency. Plus, this way he can hire professionals in every corner of the country.
4. Larry Ellison, CEO of Oracle
Larry Ellison leads a life of luxury and spends less and less time working in an office, since most of the time he runs his company from the various mansions he owns around the world. Oracle is a company that is increasingly committed to working from home, and it works.
5. Jeff Weiner, LinkedIn
Jeff Weiner doesn’t work from home, but he has a very particular way of holding business meetings. Weiner goes for walks around LinkedIn’s offices, and says that this is how he negotiates: a completely energising system with no distractions. Much of LinkedIn’s staff can also work from home, since the company believes they can be just as effective, and Weiner says that as LinkedIn grows, it won’t be necessary to spend eight hours a day in the office.
6. Matt Drudge, Drudge Report
Matt Drudge makes more than $1 million a year from his website, and he usually does it from his own home.
7. And the author of this article 😉
That’s me; why look any further? After a long career in sales, I learned that the work is out on the street. We salespeople were the productive part of the company and were never in the office, so these days my personal office is on the ground floor of my house, and my work is out on the street.
I update my blog from anywhere in the house, and when I invest in the stock market I do it both from the desktop PC at home and from my phone wherever I am. And I, too, see Marissa Mayer’s decision as a complete and utter step backwards.
Further reading
Featured image: Jeffrey C Rizzo, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
