After several days of intense international discussion about its new policy against working remotely, Yahoo is trying to distance itself from the controversy. 
 
 The company issued a statement to the New York Times in which it drew a line between the situation at Yahoo and flexible work policies in the rest of the economy: 
 
 “This isn’t a broad industry view on working from home," the statement said. "This is about what is right for Yahoo right now.” 
 
 Yahoo issued its new ban on remote work last week. The company's goal, which many insiders support, was to foster more camaraderie, intensity, and creativity from physical interaction while also eliminating some workers who had effectively retired on the job. 
 
 The ban understandably caused some grumbling from Yahoos who had joined the company precisely because they were allowed to work remotely. And then it spawned a world-wide debate in which everyone from Richard Branson to mommy bloggers weighed in. 
 
 Outside Yahoo, most observers felt that CEO Marissa Mayer's decision had set back the cause of flexible work policies and work-life balance, especially for women. Inside Yahoo, meanwhile, many applauded the move. If Yahoo is to get its mojo back, these folks argued, it needs a renewed sense of commitment from everyone on the team. 
 
 In any event, now, several days later, Yahoo has weighed in on the remote-work ban again, presumably seeking to dampen the criticism it has received. But, to her credit, Yahoo's new CEO, Marissa Mayer, is not backing down. 
 
 If nothing else, the controversy once again demonstrates Mayer's leadership abilities. For the past decade, Yahoo has been in desperate need of a CEO who is willing to set a high bar and make the tough, unpopular decisions necessary to whip the company back into shape. 
 
 In her short tenure at Yahoo, Mayer has demonstrated that she is more than capable of doing that. 
 
 SEE ALSO: Yahoos Actually Support Marissa Mayer's Ban On Remote Work 
 
 Disclosure: I work for Yahoo, as a part-time host of a Yahoo Finance show called Daily Ticker. I like working for Yahoo, and I would prefer to keep working for Yahoo, so if I felt like grumbling about a decision Yahoo made, I probably wouldn't do it here. I am also a Yahoo shareholder (a relic of my Internet exuberance in the late 1990s). ||||| Photo 
 
 In a front-page article in The New York Times on Tuesday morning, Catherine Rampell and I wrote about Yahoo ’s new policy banning employees from working remotely. The company declined to comment for that article, but on Tuesday afternoon, it issued a statement about the ban against work-at-home arrangements. 
 
 “This isn’t a broad industry view on working from home,” the statement said. “This is about what is right for Yahoo right now.” 
 
 A company spokeswoman declined to elaborate on the statement, saying, “We don’t discuss internal matters.” 
 
 But based on information from several Yahoo employees, what that statement means is that Marissa Mayer, Yahoo’s new chief executive, is in crisis mode, and she believes the policy is necessary to get Yahoo back into shape. 
 
 The employees spoke anonymously because they are not allowed to discuss internal matters. 
 
 The company also seems to be trying to distance itself from the broader national debate over workplace flexibility, and from criticism that the new policy is disruptive for employees who have family responsibilities outside work. 
 
 The work ethic at Yahoo among some workers has deteriorated over time, the Yahoo employees said, and requiring people to show up is a way to keep an eye on them and re-energize the troops. If some of the least productive workers leave as a result, the thinking goes, all the better. 
 
 Some employees have abused the former policy permitting work at home to the point of founding start-ups while being on salary at Yahoo, said the Yahoo employees and others who have worked at the company. 
 
 Several business analysts said that if work-at-home arrangements don’t work, it is generally a management problem. 
 
 Yahoo’s culture and employee morale have dissolved as it has fallen behind hotter tech companies. And, business analysts say, those are two things that are difficult to repair without having employees present in the same place. 
 
 Still, Ms. Mayer has said many times that one of her top priorities for the company is to recruit the most talented engineers and other employees. Even if requiring people to show up is the only way to repair Yahoo’s culture, it could result in losing valuable employees. 
 
 And even if Yahoo’s broader work-at-home policy needed revision, the internal memo announcing the new policy struck some as tone-deaf by implying that employees should avoid staying at home even once in a while when there are extenuating circumstances. 
 
 “For the rest of us who occasionally have to stay home for the cable guy, please use your best judgment in the spirit of collaboration,” it said.
– Marissa Mayer's recently announced ban on telecommuting at Yahoo has caused quite a brouhaha; now, the company is responding. "This isn’t a broad industry view on working from home," the firm says in a statement issued yesterday, per the New York Times. "This is about what is right for Yahoo right now." That was essentially the extent of its comments, but the Times also spoke with Yahoo workers who say a number of employees are slacking. (Earlier reports noted that Mayer had grown frustrated with employees who trickled in and left right at 5pm.) Requiring them to show up at the office could restore some enthusiasm—and allow the company to monitor the situation. Indeed, some telecommuters have even started their own companies while working from home on Yahoo's dime, the workers say. Some employees might quit, but the company would prefer to lose the dead wood. Meanwhile, at Business Insider, Henry Blodget—who works part-time for Yahoo—comes to Mayer's defense. "For the past decade, Yahoo has been in desperate need of a CEO who is willing to set a high bar and make the tough, unpopular decisions necessary to whip the company back into shape," he writes. "Mayer has demonstrated that she is more than capable of doing that."