HARBINGER

The good news is, you’ve already completed the first step! Making the decision to have your employees work from home is often a challenging one, as this will be new territory for many companies. From here you’ll have to develop a comprehensive plan that includes business continuity, communications, a work from home strategy and more. One of the most important pieces will be to make sure that your leaders are informed and have the ability to cascade updates and other important information to keep their teams engaged and connected. Check out our leader communications and work from home tip sheets for more information. It’s also crucial to engage the right groups or areas like Human Resources to ensure you have the appropriate support to address things like flexible hours, ergonomic requirements and how to measure performance in this new work environment.

There are several things you can do to keep productivity moving when you have employees in the office and working from home, but it’s important to also accept that productivity will also decrease at this time. During times of uncertainty, especially when people’s health is at risk, it’s natural for everyone to be distracted and for productivity to decrease despite all of the planning that may place. With that said, there are ways to help maintain productivity. One of the first things you can do is complete a team charter where you will agree on team etiquette and rules. Some questions to ask and agree on include: Updating your status on Microsoft Teams and respecting your colleagues status (e.g. if they’re on Busy or Do Not Disturb, do not message them!) Turning on the video for all virtual team meetings Staying home if you are sick Updated contact lists including phone numbers Another activity that can be completed is for leaders to have 1:1 meetings with each team member to develop an agile work plan including expectations and measurement. Finally, keep your employees informed with frequent updates on what’s taking place with the coronavirus, and how it will impact them. The situation is incredibly fluid and constantly changing so it will be critical to keep your employees informed of what’s taking place and what it means for them.

There will always be roles where employees will not be able to work from home. In these cases, we recommend enforcing additional health measures such as providing them with hand sanitizer, new or more frequent cleaning processes and information on how customers should be interacting with them (think social distancing). Once these new steps have been implemented, make sure you share this information with your customers as well. This can be done on your website, by providing your employees with messaging so they are able to communicate this with confidence when dealing with customers, or by email.

First and foremost, do the best you can to operate business as usual. If you have daily huddles, continue having them so that you can maintain some form of regularity. If your business is setup to operate virtually, change your meetings to digital ones and leverage the tools you have in place like SharePoint or Yammer to keep your people informed. Also don’t forget about email communications and using the phone where possible. If you’re not digitally setup, you can stay connected by setting up regular touchpoints where you can connect through conference call. Or set up group text groups. And despite everything that is taking place, don’t forget to have fun to keep your people engaged. Share tips or ideas on how to keep children entertained at home, recipes, or television and movie recommendations.

Change is hard, and we completely understand if you are not comfortable using some of the digital tools available. Our recommendation is to continue communicating and connecting with your employees in the way you feel most comfortable, and to also take advantage of this time to learn how to use other tools so that you can become more comfortable. During times of change, training is crucial. To help you through this, we’ve included some free courses and information for Microsoft Teams, Microsoft Outlook for mobile, and Microsoft Icebreaker, a new tool that uses chatbots to connect two random employees each week for a meeting.

For these types of situations, it is always good to engage your human resources team if you have one. They will be able to make the appropriate recommendations and will help you to develop a plan of action that includes how to measure performance, goals, as well as, the support you can provide them so that they can successfully work from home. You can also use this time to determine what kind of support you need to help make this transition easier for you and your employees who may have a challenging time in this new work environment. In the initial stages there will be more frequent touchpoints, but as you settle into a routine, you and your employees should find a rhythm that works for everyone.

We strongly encourage staying up-to-date with the coronavirus and recommendations from reputable health experts such as Canada’s Chief Medical Officer, Dr. Theresa Tam and government websites. You can follow Dr. Tam on Twitter and make sure to bookmark the government websites (Canada and United States of America) which are updated frequently. Use this information for guidance when making decisions for the well-being of your employees and customers.

In such circumstances, productivity will decrease. The important thing to note here, is that one of the priorities for you and your business is to do what we can to flatten the curve and keep everyone as healthy and safe as possible. There are however steps you can take to minimize the impact to productivity. See the response to question number two above.

If you haven’t done so already, develop a customer statement that provides them with more details on what you are doing as a business to protect your customers and employees at this time. This may include limiting in house appointments, shutting down your business completely, or delayed response times. Once you have developed your customer statement, share it across multiple channels including your social media channels, on your website, and through email. Also make sure to equip your employees who interact with customers with the appropriate messaging so that they can accurately rely the information. At this time, many businesses will be suffering and fortunately there have been actions taken by the government to help to alleviate the impacts of the coronavirus. More than anything, it’s important to note that your customers will appreciate and welcome the steps you are taking to keep everyone safe and healthy.

It’s natural for people at a time like this to have fear and question what is taking place. A great example of this is the toilet paper phenomenon and panic buying. It will be challenging to manage the message, however the best way to combat such reactions is to keep your people informed. Having one trusted source of information, like the President of your business, communicating at set times each day, will help to manage this. Also keeping your leaders engaged by providing approved FAQs and key messaging will go a long way. Don’t forget about developing an avenue where employees can send in their questions. This may be through a portal, or by email. Once you have answered their questions, share them with everyone in your business. Many of them are likely to be asking or wondering the same things.