Our March 16 Updated COVID-19 Guidance for Employees

Palo Alto Networks’ global crisis management team continues to closely monitor the COVID-19 outbreak. CEO and Chairman Nikesh Arora on Monday shared the following updated guidance for employees. 

Team,

It's clear that everyone is adapting to COVID-19 and its impacts. In times like this, me and my team are in constant discussion and evaluating new facts to ensure we are doing the best for all of you, our customers and Palo Alto Networks. 

There are a couple of areas we want to update you on in this rapidly changing situation:

Working from home: now mandatory for all offices until April 15

• We are updating our guidance to make work from home mandatory for all employees.
• As the situation develops, this is for the health and safety of all of us. 
• Exceptions will be rare and need to be discussed and approved by your SVP.
• Overwhelmingly, work from home has been happening at our offices already.

Strictly no visitors or family in the office at this time. 

• If in a rare, business-critical situation, you are coming to the office, ensure that there are no visitors or family members brought to the office. Thank you, everyone, for understanding.

Time Off

• If you feel unwell or are caring for someone in your family who is exhibiting symptoms, please rest, focus on your or their health. You may take sick leave, FTO, or PTO in this scenario. All you need to do is to inform your manager. 

Need for an additional monitor to get your work done from home

• If you believe that to do your job from home effectively another monitor is essential, please buy it and expense it from the approved options. 

The executive team is all committed and working towards effectively navigating these choppy waters. We can only do it with the commitment and collaboration of all of you. I am seeing it every day, whether it is the commitment of our teams to supporting customers as they secure remote working, or our workplace team in partnership with HR, and Finance ensuring uninterrupted services for our employees, or our IT teams working tirelessly to ensure that we can continue to do our business effectively. 

It is this collaboration and teamwork which will help us emerge stronger. 

Thank you, everyone, and go Palo Alto Networks!

Nikesh