AT&T CEO John Stankey wrote a lengthy memo to all company managers as a follow-up to a company-wide employee survey. AT&T is in the midst of an internal transformation. At the beginning of the year, AT&T mandated that all employees report to the office five days per week. The company is also pursuing an aggressive plan to reduce the number of work locations for white-collar workers to a smaller number of key hubs.

The memo included some blunt messages for employees. One of the key messages is the end of the concept of company loyalty. This is extraordinary for a corporation that historically put employees first. AT&T historically took pride from always promoting from within and that a lineman might someday become the CEO. The memo bluntly points out that “Some of you may have started your tour with this company expecting an ’employment deal’ rooted in loyalty . . . We have consciously shifted away from some of these elements.”

Stankey also stressed that the company culture is shifting to put customers and change first. He said it is important for employees to know what they can expect from the company, and that employees deserve the proper tools to succeed – a clear career path, a functional office environment, and good IT systems – and said the company is working hard to provide these.

But the memo warns that employees who aren’t aligned with the company’s focus should look elsewhere. For example, the memo says, “ if a self-directed, virtual, or hybrid work schedule is essential for you to manage your career aspirations and life challenges, you will have a difficult time aligning your priorities with those of the company and the culture we aim to establish. . . If the requirements dictated by this dynamic do not align to your personal desires, you have every right to find a career opportunity that is suitable to your aspirations and needs.”

You can read the entire internal email at the bottom of this article from Business Insider. It’s worth reading because it says a whole lot more than the few things I’ve cited in this blog.

It’s quite an extraordinary memo because it harkens back to a time when most large American corporations were like this, always putting the needs of the company above the needs of employees. But in the 60s and 70s, AT&T was the antithesis of the typical large corporation. AT&T had a compact with employees that they would have a job as long as they worked hard and made sure that customers were happy. When I worked at pre-divestiture AT&T, it was not unusual to be working with employees with twenty or thirty years at the company. But what was most extraordinary at the company was the degree to which most employees were extremely loyal to the company.

What I find most interesting about this shift at AT&T is that the company is running counter to trends in the workforce. Millennial and Gen-Z employees are, as a whole, more interested in work/life balance than in being a cog in a large company. A significant percentage of employees today will take less pay to be able to work from home at least a few days per week. Younger employees feel like they can develop peer relationships through electronic tools rather than by sitting in live meetings.

Will AT&T and other corporations with company-first policies be able to attract new employees over the coming decades, or will the company have to eventually adapt to the realities of the workforce? It’s not hard to imagine that the word is already getting out on social media that AT&T isn’t a place anybody wants to work. Even when AT&T finds new employees, will they stay? By telling employees that the company is not loyal to them, AT&T can’t expect employees to be loyal to the company, its goals, or its culture.

This new AT&T culture is starkly different than the culture at most smaller ISPs. I work with a lot of ISPs that value employees and keep them onboard through retirement. I’ve always thought this is the reason that small companies do so well when competing against the giant ISPs – customers can see the difference in the way the company values its employees and customers.