ASOS in drive to get staff back in office, says virtual attendance hurts performance

ASOS is aiming to get its teams back into the office for more days each week with the fashion e-tail giant believing virtual meetings are hurting its performance.

It said it wants staff to adhere to its return-to-office policy and will begin to take disciplinary action if they don’t stick to the rules.

That’s according to The Times, which quoted it saying virtual meetings have a “detrimental” impact on the company’s performance.

The business has different polices across its departments but some teams are required to work in the office at least three days a week.

And the newspaper said that creative, marketing and production teams are required to conduct most meetings in person, with virtual attendance said to put a “strain” on the wider team.

Some of the meetings that are “vital” to attend in person include those relating to “projects, brainstorms, pre-production meetings and commercial meetings”.

It also wants staff in the office so they can touch and feel the clothes in a way that’s “impossible virtually”.

The news comes as Amazon is also getting tougher on staff attendance.

In ASOS’s case, if virtual attendance really is undermining performance, the need to get staff back to peak performance is clear because the company is in the middle of a turnaround programme.

Its pandemic-linked peaks are well in the past and the business has underperformed in recent years.