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Synchrony is the country\u2019s largest provider of store credit cards, and\u00a0a stalwart member of Fortune\u2019s<\/em> Best Companies to Work For list. The company just claimed the No. 1 spot, rising from No. 37 just five years ago, and marking its ninth consecutive year on the list. It is the first financial services firm to top the list in 23 years.<\/p>\n DJ Casto, Synchrony\u2019s chief human resources officer, has a pointed message for CEOs mandating five days back in the office: you\u2019ve learned nothing.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve just been disappointed in how it pivoted,\u201d he told Fortune<\/em> at the Great Place to Work For All Summit in Las Vegas. He summed up the attitude as \u201cFive days in the office, and then I\u2019m going to check the hours and what you\u2019re working on. But you want people motivated and engaged?\u201d<\/p>\n Synchrony doesn\u2019t check the hours. The company, which employs roughly 20,000 people across hubs in Stamford, Conn., New York City, Chicago, Orlando and Costa Mesa, Calif., operates what Casto and CEO Brian Doubles call a \u201cflex model\u201d \u2014 no mandated days, no tracking of badge swipes, no surveillance. And yet the company\u2019s New York City hub at Bryant Park is so packed that employees sometimes struggle to find a seat.<\/p>\n \u201cWe don\u2019t tell anybody to do it,\u201d Casto said. \u201cI think if you go to some of my other competitors, they\u2019d have plenty of seats open \u2014 and they\u2019re mandating it.\u201d<\/p>\n To understand why Synchrony can do what JPMorgan Chase and Goldman Sachs cannot, you need to understand what Synchrony actually is.<\/p>\n The company issues private-label and co-branded credit cards for retail giants including Amazon, Walmart, Lowe\u2019s, and PayPal, serving roughly 100 million customers, all digitally. Unlike traditional banks, it operates no physical branches. There is no teller window to staff, no vault to open, no walk-in customer to greet. Every customer interaction happens by phone or online, which gives Synchrony unusual latitude to extend remote flexibility to both salaried employees and hourly contact center workers alike.<\/p>\n That equity is more radical than it sounds. Synchrony\u2019s contact center staff, who represent the majority of its workforce, operate under the same flex model as its senior vice presidents. Most hybrid arrangements at financial services peers apply only to white-collar, salaried staff. Synchrony\u2019s extends to everyone. <\/p>\n Casto pushed back on the notion that flexibility is a white-collar perk, saying it applies from the most junior frontline associate all the way up.\u00a0And critically, the flex model was not handed down from the executive suite: when Synchrony surveyed its workforce, 85% of employees said they wanted some form of remote-work option. The policy was built in response. Synchrony isn\u2019t asking employees to trust a mandate. It\u2019s honoring one.<\/p>\n The backdrop against which Synchrony is making this claim has been a sweeping, yearslong return-to-office wave across corporate America, leaving hybrid-friendly companies like Synchrony as the exception. JPMorgan Chase and Goldman Sachs moved to five-day mandates in 2025. WPP\u2019s four-day mandate prompted an employee petition with more than 18,000 signatures. A KPMG survey found 83% of CEOs expect a full return to office within three years. A Synchrony representative told Fortune<\/em> that the company has seen an increase in applicants from across the financial services sector, including large banks and other consumer finance companies.<\/p>\n CEO Brian Doubles talked to Fortune<\/em> about his own dislike of the remote environment, like when he took over the top job during the pandemic in January 2021 \u2014 when he was alone at home, on a Zoom call, with his dog sitting next to him. \u201cYou know, we had the meeting, and the board told me [I was CEO] and I was like, \u2018Okay, great,\u2019 but it was very anticlimactic.\u201d He recalled going downstairs and celebrating with his family later that night, \u201cbut it was just not how I envisioned it.\u201d He said it was just like the sports teams that won championships that year inside empty stadiums, celebrating in front of empty seats. <\/p>\n When he began thinking about how to reopen, he said he really thought about the pros and cons. \u201cI knew that that period where we were 100% remote, it was corroding the culture a bit, right?\u201d A culture is based on relationships and solving problems together, \u201cand we were still doing that, but it wasn\u2019t the same.\u201d <\/p>\n At the same time, he said he appreciated that people really enjoyed being trusted to get their work done. \u201cIf you think about what is the ultimate test in trust, it really is allowing your workforce a flexible hybrid work arrangement,\u201d Doubles said onstage in conversation with Michael C. Bush, CEO of Great Place to Work. \u201cOur employees told us that was important to them. We listened to that when we were completely remote.\u201d<\/p>\n Doubles was clear on Synchrony\u2019s hybrid model: there are no mandates to be in the office. The company does not measure time in office.\u00a0In its most recent Great Place to Work survey, 96% of Synchrony employees said they have the flexibility they need, and 93% said they feel supported to balance their work and personal lives.\u00a0This is paired with a high-performance culture and close measurement of all other metrics for which employees are responsible. Both Doubles and Casto described how they\u2019ve moved to a model of more frequent performance reviews \u2014 from annual to at least quarterly, often monthly or weekly \u2014 so employees know exactly where they stand. No matter where you\u2019re sitting in the company, you and your manager both know how you\u2019re performing.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve all been on teams where someone\u2019s not delivering at the same level as others and, you know, that\u2019s terrible for the culture. So you\u2019ve got to nip that in the bud,\u201d Doubles said. If you let that linger, your high performers and even middle performers are seeing that and thinking it\u2019s unfair.<\/p>\n The changes have paid off financially. Since Doubles committed to permanent hybrid work in 2021, Synchrony\u2019s earnings per share have climbed nearly fourfold, from roughly $2.27 in 2020 to $9.28 in 2025.\u00a0Revenue has grown steadily.<\/p>\n \u201cWe measure our employees based on results and impact and outcomes,\u201d Doubles said. \u201cDid you deliver the project on time, on budget? Is the customer happy? But we don\u2019t measure time in office.\u201d<\/p>\n He was blunt about what the old model actually looked like. \u201cWhen we were 100% in the office, were people 100% productive all the time?\u201d Doubles recalled the days of people playing solitaire or dabbling in online shopping, not specifically referring to Synchrony\u2019s old culture. \u201cI just have no interest in that level of micromanagement,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n The ranking itself is based on a confidential Trust Index Survey \u2014 administered directly to employees, not management \u2014 measuring credibility, fairness, respect, pride, and camaraderie. Companies must be Great Place to Work-certified before they\u2019re eligible for the list, making it one of the harder workplace accolades to manufacture. <\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s the cool thing about this,\u201d Casto said. It\u2019s not a pay-to-play arrangement, and if frontline contact center associates are much less happy your senior managers, companies won\u2019t make the list, or take the top spot. \u201cFlexibility shows up differently for them,\u201d Casto said about the contact center results. \u201cFirst of all, they love being able to primarily work from home. It has financially helped them a ton because, just gas. Which is big.\u201d<\/p>\n What happens in case of even higher gas prices, more geopolitical strife, more economic uncertainty? \u201cIt doesn\u2019t change my thinking at all,\u201d Casto said. In fact, it reinforces it, \u201cbecause their jobs are going to be harder. They\u2019re going to get harder calls because there\u2019s going to be more hardship in the ecosystem. So I need them to show up with more empathy and care.\u201d Casto said that in the New York ecosystem, there seemed to be a vibe of \u201cokay, pandemic\u2019s over, back to business now.\u201d He wondered, \u201cDid we learn nothing?\u201d <\/p>\n Despite all the hardship, Casto said the pandemic showed the world coming together with a sense of humanity and care, including in the workforce, and he wants to keep it that way, at least for Synchrony. \u201cHow do we deeply care for our people, create an ecosystem within our control to allow them to be their best both personally and professionally to drive peak performance?\u201d<\/p>\n Doubles and Casto stressed that they aren\u2019t remote-work absolutists. Both were emphatic that in-person work matters, just not in the way most companies are enforcing it.<\/p>\n \u201cThere are really important things that happen in person,\u201d Casto said. \u201cInnovation sprints are better in person. Mentorship is better in person. Town halls are better in person.\u201d<\/p>\n To Synchrony\u2019s top 300 leaders, Doubles ssaid grooming the next generation is part of their job description, and they\u2019re not going to do it over Microsoft Teams. He reflected on his own career. \u201cSome of the most impactful moments were just being in a meeting I wasn\u2019t supposed to be in \u2026 I might not have even had a speaking role, but I walked out of that with so much. It\u2019s hard to replicate that virtually.\u201d<\/p>\n The company has reduced its real estate footprint by roughly 50% while reimagining every remaining square foot around collaboration rather than individual, heads-down work. \u201cMeeting rooms have become exponentially more important,\u201d Casto said, adding that there\u2019s nothing quite as frustrating as being forced into the office and then hunting around for a scarce meeting room, because the office hasn\u2019t been configured for the videoconferencing world. This isn\u2019t the case at Synchrony, he stressed.<\/p>\n Still, both leaders were wary of the entitlement \u2014 in both directions \u2014 that can creep into the flexibility conversation. \u201cYou do see entitlement build up,\u201d Casto said. \u201cEntitlement by the employer: \u2018I\u2019m paying you, can\u2019t you just come in?\u2019 And entitlement by the employee: \u2018I don\u2019t think that\u2019s what I want to do.\u2019 Well, this isn\u2019t an \u00e0 la carte menu. In fact \u2026 it\u2019s work.\u201d<\/p>\n The timing of Synchrony\u2019s cultural milestone is notable. As companies across industries brace for AI-driven workforce disruption, Doubles said the trust his company has spent five years building may be its most important asset \u2014 and that the same philosophy underpinning the flex model is now shaping how Synchrony is rolling out AI.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve just tried from the very beginning to be very transparent and open with our employees,\u201d he told Fortune<\/em>. \u201cI think you lose credibility if you say it\u2019s not going to impact you. It\u2019s going to impact every single job on the planet. It just will. I truly believe that.\u201d<\/p>\n Rather than softening that message, Doubles has leaned into it, while pairing the honesty with optimism. The pitch to employees isn\u2019t that AI is coming for their jobs. It\u2019s that it\u2019s coming for the parts of their jobs they don\u2019t like. \u201cIt\u2019s going to improve the quality of their work,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s going to make them more efficient on the things that don\u2019t matter as much and free up their time, their capacity \u2014 and they can redeploy that to things that are more strategic, more challenging, and that actually add more value to the company.\u201d<\/p>\n Employees appear to be buying it, in part, Doubles argued, because they already trust him on everything else. In Synchrony\u2019s most recent Great Place to Work survey, 80% of employees said they believe AI will create opportunities for them and improve their jobs. \u201cBecause they trust us generally on all aspects of the culture and the company, they believe that we\u2019re going to leverage AI in a way that creates opportunity for the employees. And I believe we will.\u201d<\/p>\n That trust, he is careful to note, is fragile. Building it, Doubles said, is slow. Losing it is not. \u201cIt takes years to earn trust, but you can lose it in seconds. And that\u2019s what you have to watch out for.\u201d<\/p>\n The flex model itself, he said, was always the biggest trust exercise of all \u2014 bigger than any benefits program or town hall or all-hands meeting. It\u2019s paid off with a top-spot on the Best Companies list. \u201cI never thought we\u2019d be number one,\u201d Doubles said, remarking at the \u201ciconic companies\u201d that he now keeps company with. <\/p>\n \u201cLook, I think I said a couple years ago with a group of our senior leaders, I just said, \u2018Wouldn\u2019t it be cool to be a top-10 great place to work?\u2019 That was all it was \u2014 a what if.\u201d He paused. Doubles said he probably underestimated how much pride his employees would take in this status. \u201cWe just spent a couple of weeks, you know, multiple celebrations around the company and it\u2019s been, it\u2019s been pretty amazing. It\u2019s pretty incredible to see.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n #Synchrony #hybrid #Company #Work #puzzled #returntooffice #push<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Synchrony is the country\u2019s largest provider of store credit cards, and\u00a0a stalwart member of Fortune\u2019s Best Companies to Work For list. The company just claimed the No. 1 spot, rising… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1671,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[3014,630,3019,3015,1162,3020,3016,3021,3018,3017,1105],"class_list":["post-1670","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-finance-news","tag-best-companies-to-work-for","tag-company","tag-hybrid","tag-hybrid-work","tag-push","tag-puzzled","tag-remote-work","tag-returntooffice","tag-synchrony","tag-synchrony-financial","tag-work"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1670","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1670"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1670\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1671"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1670"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1670"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1670"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\nA different kind of financial services company<\/strong><\/h2>\n
\u2018The ultimate test in trust<\/strong>\u2018<\/h2>\n
\u2018This isn\u2019t an \u00e0 la carte menu<\/strong>\u2018<\/h2>\n
Building trust before the AI wave hits<\/strong><\/h2>\n