Microsoft employees in the United States are now eligible for unlimited time off, The Verge website reported. The multinational technology corporation, in an email to its employees from Kathleen Hogan, Microsoft’s chief people officer, announced the unlimited time off under a new “Discretionary Time Off” policy. This will apply to all its salaried US employees. The new rule comes into effect from January 16 and it will include unlimited vacation days as well 10 corporate holidays, leaves for sickness, bereavement and even jury duty. “How, when, and where we do our jobs has dramatically changed,” explains Hogan in the internal memo. “And as we’ve transformed, modernizing our vacation policy to a more flexible model was a natural next step.”
The Verge said that the new employees will not need to wait for their vacation days to accrue and for unused vacation time, employees will receive a payout in April. However, the new policy will not apply to the company’s hourly workers or to employees based outside of the US due to different laws and regulations. Further, mentioning the work from home policy, Microsoft said that it was not committed to having every employee work from anywhere. “We believe there is value in employees being together in the workplace,” it said. Workplaces, after the pandemic, have changed drastically and have become more liberal with time-off.
The policy is the latest in the series of measures that Microsoft has announced in the post-pandemic era. Earlier in 2021, the firm had announced a $1,500 bonus for US-based and international employees. In 2020, Microsoft allowed more of its employees to work from home permanently while also allowing employees to work from home freely for up to 50 per cent of their working week. Microsoft isn’t the first tech company to announce a policy like this. Salesforce, LinkedIn, Oracle, and Netflix also offer similar unlimited time off policies.
