Canada failed to learn from Trump's mistakes on return to office: researcher

U.S. President Donald Trump speaks to Prime Minister Mark Carney at the G7 Summit in France in June. Photo by Anna Moneymaker /GETTY IMAGES

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U.S. President Donald Trump’s abrupt return-to-office mandate for federal employees damaged morale and eroded trust across the U.S. public service, according to a recent study whose author believes Canada has failed to learn from those mistakes.

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The study, a peer-reviewed article published in the Review of Public Personnel Management, looked at the aftermath of a “dramatic” policy reversal that sent U.S. public servants back into the office full-time in 2025.

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On the first day of his second term in office, Trump issued a presidential memorandum directing executive branch departments and agencies to “terminate” remote work agreements and bring workers back in-person.

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At the same time, Trump pursued deep cuts to the public service through the Elon Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency, widely known as DOGE.

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Étienne Charbonneau, the corresponding author on the study and a professor at the National School of Public Administration, said his research highlights the potential negative consequences of rigid return-to-office mandates.

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Recognizing the move away from hybrid work was more immediate south of the border, Charbonneau said the Canadian government missed an opportunity to learn from the intense blowback to Trump’s actions.

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“This happened right next door, and it was documented in a language that people in Ottawa could understand,” he said.

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“Why are they doing the same mistakes many months after and not learning? Why haven’t they paid attention?”

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Workforce ‘under strain’

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Much like in Canada, many U.S. government organizations turned to hybrid work during the COVID-19 pandemic.

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The practice varied widely from one workplace to the next. Regardless, by mid-2024, more than 200,000 U.S. federal public servants worked fully remote, according to the study, while many more were under some sort of hybrid work arrangement.

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As a result, Trump’s January 2025 return-to-office mandate affected more than one million executive branch employees, with only limited exceptions.

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The study examined three national surveys of U.S. federal employees conducted by the Federal News Network — a digital and radio news organization that covers the American government. The first survey was done before the return-to-office mandate, the second immediately afterward, and the final months later.

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The study found many public servants responded to the return-to-office mandate with anger, frustration and a sense of betrayal. Many reported lower perceived productivity. For some, the loss of autonomy damaged trust in their employer.

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Taken together, the findings pointed to a workforce “under strain,” the study found.

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“Across waves, respondents emphasized that the return was not a neutral adjustment but an emotionally charged rupture, often described as ‘destroying morale,’ ‘eroding trust,’ or ‘making me not want to work for these people anymore,’” it read.