150 Harvard Alumni Affairs Staff Face Two-Day In-Office Mandate Amid Pushback

Roughly 150 staff in Harvard’s Alumni Affairs and Development office will be required to work in person twice a week beginning the week of Oct. 5, prompting fierce pushback from employees who accused administrators of ignoring contractual flexible-work protections.

Employees in the FAS Development and AA&D’s Advancement Communications, Events, and Donor Relations teams were informed by their supervisors Tuesday of the new requirement, according to emails obtained by The Crimson.

The policy was initially scheduled to take effect in September. But AA&D leaders later pushed the start date to Oct. 5 after realizing the first required in-office day for some staff would fall on Yom Kippur.

AA&D spokesperson Cameron Wolfsen said the new requirement would apply to about 150 of the organization’s roughly 400 employees.

Though the two teams employ more than 150 people combined, workers hired specifically for fully remote roles or covered by prior formal remote-work agreements will be exempt, according to FAQ documents distributed to staff and obtained by The Crimson. All of Harvard’s current AA&D job listings are for hybrid roles.

The mandate follows a tumultuous year in the alumni affairs office, which underwent a large-scale restructuring this spring, laying off dozens of employees and losing several senior leaders. It also extends Harvard’s push away from remote work beyond Harvard College.

AA&D leader Jim Husson had begun shifting the organization toward in-person work months before this week’s announcement, according to six people familiar with the office. Some teams were encouraged — or strongly encouraged — to come in for in-person “anchor days” earlier this year.

Wolfsen confirmed that Husson gave his direct reports leeway to increase in-person attendance before the policy was announced and told staff to anticipate spending more time in the office.

Still, the decision drew immediate pushback from staff and union representatives.

During an all-staff town hall Wednesday, Harvard Union of Clerical and Technical Workers representative John Baglione addressed his “union siblings” after Husson delivered opening remarks.

Senior Director of Human Resources Shannon Gerah told Baglione that there was only time for a short comment on the new policy and said HUCTW had been consulted about the change.

“I can make it as short as I want, but I do think that people should be aware of the protections and the rights that they have moving forward,” Baglione responded, according to two AA&D staff members.

Baglione went on to reference the HUCTW union contract’s flexible-work provisions, which state that changes to established arrangements should not be implemented without discussion and reasonable notice.

“An email decree is not a discussion,” he said, according to the two staffers. “It’s a directive that we did not agree to and goes against what we did agree to.”

Baglione called the return-to-office requirement a “regressive pay cut” that could “destroy productivity” and “hinder our climate goals.”

In a Thursday statement to The Crimson, Baglione argued that AA&D leaders had failed to demonstrate a need for more in-office work.

“The message received from the meetings yesterday is that an acclaimed advancement team that has reliably brought in over $1 billion a year since the Pandemic needs to sacrifice our money, time, life balance, and overall well-being based on leadership’s personal preference,” he wrote.

“It’s not good enough that ‘everyone else is doing it,’” he wrote. “This is Harvard, we set the standard.”

In response to a request for comment, Wolfsen referred The Crimson to a Wednesday message from Husson telling staff that “AA&D values the flexibility that remote work offers as well as a vibrant physical office that allows informal interactions and opportunities to strengthen community over time.”

Husson directed employees with further questions to breakout meetings with their individual teams later that day. Those gatherings also proved contentious.

During a meeting with FAS Development staff, Associate Vice President and Dean of FAS Development Michael Faber acknowledged that the initial start date had been pushed back two weeks after leaders realized it fell on Yom Kippur.

“This was a mistake and an oversight, and I regret the error,” Faber said, according to an AA&D staff member, thanking employees who contacted him to “signal their disappointment.”

In a separate meeting, Associate Vice President of Communications, Events, and Donor Relations Meg Tiede defended the shift toward in-person work and said she had personally pushed to implement the two-day requirement, according to two members of the unit.

Tiede said the decision was not based on employee performance metrics, the staff members added.

Faber similarly told his staff that the change had “nothing to do with productivity” because the team was already performing well. Instead, he said, working in person could make it easier for employees to receive help, respond to others, and provide honest feedback and mentorship.

He described two days per week as a “compromise” for an organization with a “really strong remote work culture,” acknowledging that employees had made decisions about housing, child care, elder care, and commuting based on existing arrangements.

Asked whether AA&D had collected data since introducing anchor days to assess employees’ views on in-person work, Faber said the organization would be “surveying” staff “about the ways that we can optimize our time together.”

The office may also face logistical hurdles in bringing 150 employees back in person.

Four people familiar with the matter said AA&D had given up some of its office space in previous years as employees shifted to remote work. Three said the organization had reduced its footprint at 124 Mount Auburn St. from four floors to just two.

Asked how the organization could afford additional office space after laying off workers because of budget constraints, Faber said there was no budget for renovating the office and that AA&D was “just beginning those conversations.”

Husson also acknowledged the space problem during the town hall.

“We all know our floors in 124 need some work,” Husson said, according to the two AA&D staffers. “How much is possible? I think that remains to be seen.”

The FAQs distributed to employees acknowledged that “space constraints are a real concern” and said staff should “expect more communication” about efforts to optimize available space for the long term.

The decision comes weeks after Harvard College imposed a more stringent in-office policy, requiring employees to work on campus five days per week while classes are in session and two days per week during academic breaks and the summer.

Faber framed AA&D’s two-day requirement as a compromise between in-person collaboration and employee flexibility.

“Harvard is a place, right?” Faber said. “We’re not a multinational corporation that it doesn’t matter whether the work takes place in London or Singapore.”

—Staff writer Amann S. Mahajan can be reached at [email protected] and on Signal at amannsm.38. Follow her on X @amannmahajan.

—Staff writer Elise A. Spenner can be reached at [email protected] or on Signal at elisespenner.82. Follow her on X @EliseSpenner.