COVID-19 and the immediate implications for businesses have been dominating our thoughts for the past month. However, businesses are starting to look forward to what work will look like when restrictions lift. Obvious challenges arise, but also opportunities.
Many employers now have staff on leave or working reduced hours. There is enormous uncertainty and colleagues want to know that the organisations they work for are secure. Longer term HR projects have been bypassed in an instant. However, it is more important than ever before that employers speak to their staff. Employers will also need to consider certain fundamental questions about how their workforce will align to their likely requirements when they are able to restart operations.
Here are some of the key People Issues that we are already discussing with our clients.
Managing employee engagement in a remote workforce
Employee engagement is a key metric for many clients. Improving engagement can be a slow build and gains won over time risk being lost to a workforces which are at home and disconnected. Lockdown has been extended, furlough and variation decisions made but the employment relationship continues. Government guidance encourages employee training during furlough and contact can continue provided that the employee honours their agreement to cease all work. Employers are considering new engagement strategies directed at maintaining contact and buy in. An absence of information is likely to create uncertainty and worry. Creating new structured touch points will be critical.
Mental well-being
Whilst employers may now be much more alive to the importance of supporting colleagues’ mental health, social isolation and the impact of Covid 19 has brought an entirely new set of challenges for employees managing mental health conditions. People Teams are stretched and understandably focussed on implementing the steps their businesses are taking to respond to the crisis. Day to day touch points from HR and mental health first aiders are not immediately available. Businesses still have to consider how to help people cope with the pressures of working from home, often mixing long days under pressure with the pressures of home schooling. What new alert systems can be put in place? How do you plan to transition back to work for those whose depression or anxiety may mean that they are disabled. Added to this how can employers ensure they are informed and support those colleagues who will face bereavement?
Will working from home and/or working flexibly become the new normal?
Employers have moved mountains to relocate their staff to new home work locations. We have seen professional offices, engineering firms and even international call centres successfully (and to the outside world seamlessly) transition to home working over a few short days. Now this move has been achieved, is this something which might suit both employer and employee on a more permanent basis? Technology is allowing more effective interaction and management than many employers thought possible. If lockdown shows to employers that their employees can work productively and effectively from a remote location then does this force some employers to consider the potential benefits (and savings) of changing their operating models long term. If employers intend to transition to greater home working then what steps will be needed to implement this sort of change; changes to employment contracts, changes to certain benefits, more systematic risk assessments, clearer insurance arrangements for employees working from home.
Likewise, many employers and employees have had to adapt quickly to flexible working patterns (stretched or fragmented working days which incorporate homeschooling for example) to accommodate caring responsibilities.
Will the reluctance some employers have had to agreeing flexible working requests fall away in light of the evidence of staff working hard and effectively at home and supporting their employers during very difficult times? And will this mark the beginning of a new generation of flexibility with employees expecting employers to agree to continue the flexibility they’ve become accustomed to?
Managing social media
New policies are likely to be needed for managing the use / misuse of social media remotely. Does your data protection policy sufficiently cover employees who would normally not be working at home with confidential matters? Are you happy that Zoom and other alternative video conferencing platforms allow work to be undertaken safely and securely?
The reboot - what is the plan for bringing employees back into work?
Information remains scarce about how the government plans for businesses to emerge from lockdown, but restrictions will almost certainly apply over an extended period. It will not be a case of all staff simply being called back to work one Monday this summer. The process of bringing some colleagues back into the workplace will require very careful planning.
Employees may need to be recalled from furlough in which case consider what notice will be required and how will this be communicated. What about a graduated return, if restrictions are lifted but only to a limited extent, how do businesses bring part of the workforce back only? How does it we choose those who come back first? Whilst policy decisions need to be taken, individual circumstances will need to be considered given the concerns some colleagues may have about returning “too early”.
And what if testing of employees becomes necessary to facilitate a return to work? Employers will not be able to require colleagues to submit to a test without their consent. The justification for the tests would be the health and safety reasons associated with trying to ensure as safe a workplace as possible but this sort of approach would need to be very carefully thought out and documented. It would also throw up important data protection considerations in that obtaining health information about an individual is special category personal data and an employer can only process such data on certain grounds under GDPR.
What about more strategic change?
The furlough scheme has just been extended to the end of June, in part to ensure that employers have more time to take stock on what the longer term impact of Covid-19 is likely to be on their businesses. Some businesses may see growth opportunities and may be looking to potential TUPE transfers picking up contracts or business as a result of others being unable to see out this period. Others may identify that efficiencies are required for their businesses to come through this situation in a position to rebuild. Reorganisation (growth or retraction) requires planning. Prescriptive consultation obligations apply both on acquiring contracts / businesses and on implementing changes which may result in redundancies. If employers want those changes to be timed so that their businesses are structured as they want them at the time that restrictions start to be lifted then planning needs to start now.
Very significant issues arise for HR Professionals across the country. These unique circumstances will require some novel solutions and it seems clear that those businesses and organisations who adapt quickest and most successfully will enjoy a considerable advantage.
