When AT&T CEO John Stankey informed staff members in a memo this month that the business is moving toward a "market-based culture" that necessitates tighter collaboration, it caused a stir.
Business Insider has now confirmed that AT&T is relocating 22 internal help-desk facilities into six locations. The managers who will be impacted have two weeks to decide whether to relocate or get severance pay and job loss. Unionized employees will be permitted to continue working in a different customer service support capacity at their existing workplace.
The corporation has been using this strategy since 2023 as it modernizes its technology and reduces legacy expenses, and the consolidation of so-called centralized support desk personnel, who primarily help fellow AT&T employees, is part of that strategy. Additionally, the shifts coincide with corporate America—particularly the tech sector—embracing a hardcore culture that prioritizes time spent in the office, performance metrics, and a reinvigorated feeling of hustling.
Business Insider was informed by two managers of the strategy to reduce the number of help desk locations to six. A corporate representative acknowledged in a statement that the company is cutting back on work sites throughout the business unit, but she declined to disclose on how many centers would stay.
The spokesperson claimed that Stankey's take-it-or-leave-it memo, which was his candid reaction to an internal poll that revealed decreasing employee engagement at work, had nothing to do with the relocation.
Instead of taking a few years to implement the help-desk consolidation, one AT&T management told Business Insider that they realized the department's leadership was accelerating the timeline due to the Stankey memo.
Moving managers to locations in Atlanta, Mesa, Arizona, Miami, Orlando, Richardson, Texas, and Tulsa, Oklahoma, is part of the plan, according to the same manager. When asked how many staff might be impacted, the spokesman did not answer.
In an email provided by Business Insider, one of the managers—who is moving hundreds of miles out of state—stated that they would have to pay for their own relocation costs. They believe they have no choice but to move their family.
Business Insider was informed by a half-dozen employees that department heads were instructed this month to create "action plans" to address issues regarding AT&T's operations and location that were brought up in a recent employee survey.
According to an AT&T representative, the moves will improve the business in streamlining its operations. "It reflects ongoing strategic shifts across our call center operations to colocate similar work functions and improve efficiency, consistency, and teamwork," said a spokesman.
Similar stages of abandoning satellite offices in favor of larger, centralized hubs have been experienced by a number of corporate divisions.
In 2023, the corporation made headlines when it announced that, instead of 300 offices across the US, some 60,000 managers will be distributed to nine metro areas. At the time, Stankey told Bloomberg that about 9,000 individuals would have to make relocation decisions.
A five-day required in-office schedule was implemented this year after the workplace footprint was reduced.
According to internal data examined by Business Insider, some teams have shrunk by half as a result of these relocation orders and the RTO mandate.
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