The end of “results only” at Best Buy is bad news

When Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer recently put an end to that company’s telecommuting policy, it kicked off a wide-ranging discussion over the merits of working remotely. Now Best Buy’s CEO Hubert Joly is getting attention for also killing his company’s flexible work policy in an effort to improve the fortune of the ailing consumer electronics retailer. But is such an approach really the right way to go? Some see Joly’s decision as little more than a “Chainsaw” Al Dunlap effort to impose harsh short-term policies to shock the company into greater productivity (and improved share price), but in reality it erodes the long-term culture and sense of worker morale that flexible work schedules facilitate.