Elon Musk has scrapped Twitter’s working from home policy and ordered its staff back to the office, the Guardian reports.

Musk told Twitter’s employees in an email, seen by the Guardian, that its “road ahead is arduous and will require intense work to succeed”. He added that, going forward, employees would only be allowed to work from home in special circumstances, approved by himself.

“Remote work is no longer allowed, unless you have a specific exception. Managers will send the exception lists to me for review and approval,” Musk wrote.

He added that the new policy, first reported by Bloomberg, would be effective from today for a minimum of 40 hours a week.

The missive comes less than a week after Musk laid off around half of the company’s 7,500-strong workforce, and introduced a £6.99-per-month charge for the Twitter Blue subscription service that gives users a blue tick of authentication next to their username, as well as early access to forthcoming features. Musk has told Twitter staff that he wants subscriptions to account for half of Twitter’s revenues going forward.

Musk has also removed “days of rest” from Twitter staff calendars. This was an additional monthly day off for all employees, first introduced during the pandemic.