Apple's head of machine learning research resigns due to 'remote work cancellation'

By Shinya Suzuki

As the COVID-19 pandemic has led to more companies adopting remote work , companies are beginning to diverge on when and how to resume normal activities as the pandemic calms down. Apple announced a policy of lifting its remote work policy in May 2020 and working in the office for a few days a week, but according to a report by Zoe Schiffer, a reporter for The Verge , Apple's director of machine learning, Ian Goodfellow, resigned after four years at the company due to 'dissatisfaction with returning to office work,' sparking a variety of opinions on remote work.

Apple's Director of Machine Learning Resigns Due to Return to Office Work - MacRumors
https://www.macrumors.com/2022/05/07/apple-director-of-machine-learning-resigns/

Since Twitter became the first major company to allow employees to work remotely permanently even after the COVID-19 pandemic has ended, other major companies have announced their own policies regarding remote work. Amazon has allowed full remote work, leaving the number of days in the office to 'team discretion,' Google has repeatedly postponed the timing of the return of office work, and Meta , the company that operates Facebook, has announced that many of its employees will be able to work remotely in the long term. Major companies are planning to continue remote work permanently or for the long term.

Twitter will allow employees to work from home even after the COVID-19 pandemic ends - GIGAZINE

Meanwhile, Apple was reported to be moving forward with plans to bring employees back to the office in May 2020, with CEO Tim Cook asking employees to work two days a week remotely and three days a week in the office starting in September 2021. Some employees rebelled against this request, sending a letter to CEO Cook stating, 'We ask for a flexible approach that allows us to work fully remotely.'

Employees are opposed to Apple's planned 'two days a week remote work, three days a week in the office' policy, calls for work style reform grow - GIGAZINE

In response to backlash from employees, it was announced that the introduction of 'two days a week remote work, three days a week in the office' would be extended until February 2022, but CEO Cook then notified employees that 'the date for returning to the office has not been determined,' which appeared to be an indefinite postponement of the lifting of remote work,according to Zoe Schiffer, a reporter for technology news media The Verge.

However, according to a new report by Schiffer on May 8, 2022, Ian Goodfellow, who had been director of Apple's machine learning research team since 2019 after serving as a member of the top AI research team at Google, announced his resignation and in an email sent to staff upon his resignation, expressed his dissatisfaction with returning to office work, saying, 'Apple is requiring employees to work in the office two days a week by April 11. I strongly believe that increased flexibility was the best solution for my team.'

Ian Goodfellow, Apple's director of machine learning, is leaving the company due to its return to work policy. In a note to staff, he said “I strongly believe that more flexibility would have been the best policy for my team.” He was likely the company's most cited ML expert.

— Zoë Schiffer (@ZoeSchiffer) May 7, 2022

Mr. Goodfellow is a master of deep learning who developed the artificial intelligence algorithm ' Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs) '. MacRumors, which compiles news and opinions related to Apple and Apple products, has lamented Mr. Goodfellow's resignation, saying, 'Apple has lost its best talent to its competitors due to its corporate policy.' In addition, while there are sympathetic opinions such as 'It is quite difficult to return to a stressful office after working from a comfortable home' and 'If you work on software, you should hardly need an office', there are also contrasting comments such as 'Productivity at home is definitely lower than productivity in the office', 'Teaming up to work face-to-face several times a week is very important for software development', and 'The fact that we are developing products that are closely related to the user's life at home in a relaxed home is unsettling', and there are discussions about the policy of remote work and office work as the pandemic calms down.