As a result of the Pandemic, businesses and employees across the world have made fundamental changes to the way in which they work and, for some businesses that have never considered home working for their employees, this will mean that they will have found themselves in a position where they have been forced to see how a more flexible approach could work in their business. 

 

There is no doubt that the Covid-19 virus global pandemic will impact each and every one of us, whether we are business owners, employees or self-employed workers, and will change the way in which we work. 

 

So, as we all try to look for the silver lining in these challenging times, here are some positives that we have taken: 

 

Although some businesses have been forced to halt all recruitment activity, some employers are still pressing ahead.  This means a move from face-to-face interviews to virtual recruitment, something which a lot of businesses may not have considered previously and may now find a useful tool to integrate into their future standard recruitment process, especially in the initial recruitment stages. 

 

For those employers who have been reluctant to consider allowing employees to work from home (because they did not believe it would work in their business), they will have been afforded the opportunity to see how it can work in reality.  We know that it won’t work for all businesses and that some will be keen to revert back to office based at a later date, for some, they may be surprised at how well it has worked and could mean that they are able to change the face of how they work as a business and offer increased flexibility to employees in future. 

 

In addition, we have already seen an increase in candidates that are looking for more flexible working with the ability to work from home and, those businesses that are able to embrace this new way of working, will ultimately open their recruitment processes up to a larger candidate pool. 

 

Changes to our office space 

 

Hopefully your employee’s physical and mental wellbeing has always been an area of focus but during this period it will have become more important than ever. Some employees may have embraced the changes they are facing in working style but for some, this period of uncertainty and change may have had a more negative effect.  

 

Everything we are currently experiencing highlights the importance of our teams and the services they provide to make our businesses a success. When we come out of the other side of Covid-19 we will see a greater awareness and support of the overall wellbeing of our employees.  

 

Better communication and relationships 

Throughout the pandemic we will all have been making more effort to communicate with one another (both at work and with our family and friends). We will have reached out and connected with people who we may not have connected with under normal circumstances and for some, they will have adapted to a new way of communicating altogether. Many will be picking up the phone or video calling where they may usually have relied on emails purely to have some human interaction in their working day! 

 

When we all come out of the other side of this pandemic (it feels a long way off but we will!) we will have undoubtedly built better relationships with one another.  This will be felt within each and every business as business owners and employees come together and face this situation head on, in order to weather the storm.   

 

We should all seek to harness this team spirit and reflect on how we have supported one another through one of most challenging times we will face as a nation and look to build upon this as we move forward.