Report: Walmart Corporate Employees to Return to Office in November

Walmart’s corporate employees will begin to return to the retailer's Arkansas headquarters and other offices across the country in early November, according to a companywide memo obtained by CNBC. In a memo sent to employees Oct. 22, the big-box retailer said employees will “transition to working together in our campus offices on a more regular basis” starting the week of Nov. 8.

“We are a company whose success is attributed to our people,” Donna Morris, chief people officer, Walmart, wrote in the memo obtained by CNBC. “While technology has enabled us to succeed while working virtually throughout the pandemic, there's no substitution for being in offices together — it helps shape our culture, collaborate, innovate, build relationships and move faster.” 

Morris said company leaders will notify employees about expectations for return to office based on their role. She also said Walmart’s global technology team will continue to primarily work virtually. That team includes software engineers and data scientists. Walmart is requiring corporate employees to get COVID-19 vaccinations.

Total Retail's Take: When Walmart, the country’s largest private employer with 1.6 million workers, makes a major decision around how it's handling its return-to-office strategy, people listen. Many retailers are still struggling with what their return-to-work strategies will look like, so it's helpful to see what Walmart is doing. Over the past several months, many retailers have pushed back return-to-office dates or shared updates about their plans. Amazon.com, for example, said last week that it will leave it up to individual team directors to decide how often their employees work in the office. Target said in August that it won’t require employees to return to its headquarters until 2022.