Lockdown: Preparing and Pacing Your Return to the Office

Preparing and Pacing Your Return to the Office

As the spread of COVID-19 fades in certain parts of the world, countries are preparing to (or have already started) easing the lockdowns and restrictions put into place to curb community spread. Malaysia recently dropped its Movement Control Order (MCO) on the 4th of May, India is due to lift restrictions on the 17th of May, Japan plans to lift its State-of Emergency in a few recovering regions, and New Zealand is confident of reopening retail stores and restaurants in the middle of May, after a 7-week long lockdown.

While the threat of fresh clusters emerging in the wake of the lift remains, many parts of the world seem posed to return back to normal work. As we move into the year 2021, the lockdown continues to be a common approach applied by the government to contain and limit the infection rate of its citizens.

But going back to the office is not so simple. Fresh clusters of COVID-19 cases, as mentioned above, are and have occurred. Wuhan itself, weeks after the lockdown ended, recently discovered their first major cluster again. Every business needs to plan for an orderly, gradual, and detailed return to work operations, taking into account the health and safety of employees and work operations alike.

The Return to Normal Plan

The Business Continuity timeline is divided into 4 phases: Pre-planning, Immediate Response, Resumption, and Restoration and Return. Resumption, in a Business Continuity (BC) context, coincides with the remote working measures companies have put into place to continue their business operations. Restoration, on the other hand, ties in with Return to Normalcy. In the wake of COVID-19, all BC plans should be updated, modified and expanded upon to take into account a Pandemic.

Some of the Business Continuity Plan should cover include:

Identification of Stakeholders

Within the Business Continuity Plan, the Crisis Management Team (CMT), Business Continuity Coordinator (BCC) and his/her team, the Crisis Communication Team (CCT) as well as the incident Management Team should be identified. The team leader and members of each team should be in the annexes of a BC plan, with names, emails, phone number(s) readily available and updated on at least an annual basis to ensure the information remains consistent. These people (mostly the Crisis Management Team) will be the ones making the decisions on the if and the when (and in what manner) all staff will return to the office.

Establish a Sequential Checklist/List of Procedures

The need to quickly establish a sequential checklist and/or list of procedures to ensure all factors are accounted for before a return to the office.

A list of procedures within the Restoration and Return section of the BC plan will highlight in detail some of the steps needed prior to returning back to the worksite. While some of these steps, like the transference of workplace equipment, will be done from a Business Unit level (which is to say individual departments will handle it), there are some issues Management will have to determine before committing to the worksite, specifically:

Is it safe for your employees?

While the government may have lifted the official Lockdown restrictions, some areas may be more badly hit by others. Perhaps there's a cluster close by that makes management want to reconsider sending them back to work on the same day the Lockdown is lifted. Additionally, there might be difficult to find the proper commute in certain post-lockdown situations, as public transport might not be readily available

Are the physical premises accessible?

Can staff physically return to the premises in a safe manner? Will the landlord of the building/place allow it?

What happens if someone in the office gets infected?

Should I bring back my entire team?

In relation to the last point on staff infection, no. Not everyone in the company needs to return at the start of the work premises being reestablished.