“Vaccination is one of the most important ways to keep ourselves and our community healthy for the next few months,” Pichai said in an email.
This policy will be applied to offices in the United States in the coming weeks and will be extended to other regions in the coming months.
However, when implementing it, it will not be applied until widespread vaccination becomes possible, taking into consideration local regulations and vaccination status. There are also exceptions for those who cannot be vaccinated for medical or other protected reasons.
In line with this, he has also announced that he will update the telecommuting policy and extend the resumption of work, which was originally scheduled for September, to October 18.
He also acknowledges that some people are worried about coming to work due to the surge in Delta strains, and will continue to closely monitor the data and notify at least 30 days before moving to a full office return plan.
If there are special circumstances, he plans to expand telecommuting until the end of 2021.
We don’t know how many Google employees are vaccinated, but Pichai said, “It’s encouraging that the Google community has a very high vaccination rate in areas where vaccines are widely available.” This is “a major reason why employees who wish to return early can open their offices with peace of mind”.
In addition, Facebook has also announced that vaccination is a condition for going to the US office, and it is expected that such companies will increase in the future.