MW Jamie Dimon wants workers in the office. So why is he letting JPMorgan's European chief work remotely?

By Weston Blasi

An apparent return-to-office double standard has sparked a conversation online: 'Rules for thee but not for me'

JPMorgan Chase Chief Executive Jamie Dimon has publicly railed against the remote-work movement, and he is one of the few prominent executives who have required employees to return to the office five days per week.

But Dimon's companywide policy doesn't appear to include everybody - particularly executives, who can sometimes have different rules.

The chief of JPMorgan's $(JPM)$ operations in Europe, Africa and the Middle East is relocating to New York, according to recent reports from the Financial Times and Bloomberg. That may cause some to wonder why an executive can oversee a business unit on another continent - and across an ocean, no less - while local workers cannot work from home sometimes.

Indeed, some workers have been discussing in social-media posts on forums like Reddit (RDDT) that there appears to be a different set of rules for executives from those that apply to them.

"RTO for the serfs, work from home for the aristocracy. Yep sounds about right," one Reddit user posted, referencing the banking behemoth's return-to-office mandate.

"Rules for thee but not for me. I despise these double standards," another Reddit user posted.

'Rules for thee but not for me. I despise these double standards.'

This is phenomenon has been observed previously. Starbucks $(SBUX)$ hired a new CEO, Brian Niccol, last year and gave the former Chipotle $(CMG)$ chief executive the perk of being able to work remotely from California instead of relocating to the coffee giant's Seattle headquarters. Victoria's Secret $(VSCO)$ granted the same privilege to its new CEO, Hillary Super, last year.

So why do some executives get more freedom than an average employee? "Big organizations need to build in flexibility to be able to attract talent," Alex Alonso, chief data and analytics officer at SHRM, a human-resources trade association, told MarketWatch.

And many bosses these days want to work from home even more than their employees do. A 2024 survey of 3,000 American workers and managers from software firm Checkr found that 68% of bosses (defined as middle managers, executives and business owners) said they would like remote work to continue, while less than half (48%) of employees agreed.

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Logistics play another part. Companies are more willing to give executives WFH solutions on a case-by-case basis than constantly overhauling a companywide policy that impacts thousands of workers.

"The number of jobs where you have to create executive exemption [for work from home] is smaller - there are not as many executive jobs," Alonso noted.

And the needs and nature of individual industries, like international banking, play another part. "It's common for many organizations to tie flexibility of work location to what is required for the job," Alonso said. "Where are the regulatory centers, and the key interdependencies for that individual? If it's something that's more suited in a financial center of the U.S., then you could make a case for it."

So what does this tell us about the attitudes surrounding remote and hybrid work? According to the KPMG 2024 U.S. CEO Outlook, business leaders' sentiment regarding in-office work has undergone a significant shift toward having employees come back.

And per KPMG, 86% of CEOs who participated in the survey said that they would make an effort to reward employees who come to the office via favorable assignments, promotions and raises.

This contrasts sharply with the current reality, however, as 52% of employed Americans are still working remotely at least part-time, a 2025 Gallup survey shows. And nearly every poll taken after the pandemic shows that U.S. workers prefer remote or hybrid work over a fully in-person schedule.

One 2024 survey from the Top Employers Institute found that 62% of America's youngest workers (age 18 to 27) would even take a pay cut to achieve better work-life balance - with 82% saying it was important to have flexibility in their schedule.

The JPMorgan regional executive, Filippo Gori, is slated to work five days in the company's New York office and spend half his time in the EMEA region.

JPMorgan Chase declined comment.

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Dimon, for his part, went on a now-viral screed against remote work earlier this year.

"Dont give me this sh- that work-from-home Friday works," Dimon said. "I call a lot of people on Friday, [and] there's not a g-damn person you can get a hold of.

"The young generation is being damaged by this," he added. "This company is going to set our own standards and do it our own way."

Other banking-business leaders, including Goldman Sachs $(GS)$ CEO David Solomon, have expressed displeasure with remote work, too. Outside of banking, Tesla $(TSLA)$ CEO Elon Musk has called remote work "morally wrong," while President Donald Trump signed an executive order earlier this year requiring federal department heads to "terminate remote work arrangements."

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The research on remote work is mixed. There are studies that show in-person work may indeed impact factors like creativity and collaboration. A 2024 Gallup poll, for example, showed that just 35% of U.S. workers said collaborative work is best done remotely, while communication and collaboration were deemed the biggest obstacles to remote work, managers featured in the poll said. On the other hand, other research suggests that the work-life balance stemming from a more flexible, hybrid work schedule makes employees happier and, indeed, more productive.

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-Weston Blasi

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June 28, 2025 10:26 ET (14:26 GMT)

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