Mission Possible – restarting the workplace

Author
Mark Bouch
Managing Director | Leading Change Limited
26th May 2020

Introduction

Our government recently published a strategy for economic recovery[1] and a progressive easing of the lockdown rules in place since March. Publication of various government guidelines for businesses aiming to restart offered a positive and welcome step in re-opening the workplace and establishing our ‘new normal’ [2].  Yet despite this, business leaders responsible for re-starting the workplace face multiple considerations, many of which are unfamiliar.  They include concerns for people’s safety and well-being, the need to understand and analyse the unfamiliar risks associated with the spread of viral infection to implement new ways of working, and concerns about how to engage employees, customers, suppliers and the general public to build the confidence necessary to return to the workplace.  So, how should companies balance the multiple considerations of people’s health, business impact, changes to customer demand and supply chain interruption? How can they remain sufficiently agile to respond to further changes as the situation evolves? Is it Mission Impossible?

Many leaders understand that a risk-free approach is not an option[3]. There will soon be limits to the lifeline of government financial support and we don’t yet know when a new vaccine will be available. When considering re-starting the workplace, it’s probably sensible to assume there will be limited availability of testing; it will not be clear for some time whether previous exposure to the COVID-19 disease conveys immunity (and for how long) and prolonged use of PPE may be neither practical or necessary.  

Despite economic pressure on business leaders to get things moving again, delay, inaction or overly cautious responses often prevail because of perceived risks, the potential for criticism, and employee or public backlash. Experience suggests that sound risk discussions are logical, objective and based on data, but the decisions leaders make are usually influenced by, or based entirely on, risk perception.  To make the task of restarting the workplace Mission Possible, there are three core tasks leadership must pay close attention to:

1.Public safety: These include informed occupational health considerations for employees, visitors, clients, contractors, suppliers, and the general public.

2.Transition to the ‘new normal’:  Planning and implementing workplace change necessary to achieve your business goals. 

3.Communications: Engaging people to shape realistic and acceptable perceptions of risk and build trust.

To provide comprehensive expert advice, I sought contributions from two trusted associates who are subject matter experts in their respective fields:

Public Safety

Dr David Slavin is a former Surgeon Commander RN and leading occupational health physician. He has worked in pharmaceutical R&D and currently provides occupational health advice to NHS Trusts in the South West. David’s advice is:

Understanding risk requires a structured methodical and repeatable approach. It is also an ongoing activity, not one to be done once and forgotten. The basics are to identify any hazard, or potential hazard, who is at risk and how then develop and implement the mitigation.  This includes identifying and implementing risk controls, protocols, and policies to achieve desired safety whilst ensuring your workplace is productive. A hazard might be as simple as a confined space, or an area where people unofficially congregate.

It’s vital to put the risk in the context of your critical business activities: what you need to do in the near-term to survive and recover. When looking at business-critical activities, think about the ‘Justification and Optimisation’ principles established in Health and Safety law.

From a public safety perspective, there are practical elements to consider. You need to identify the specific changes required in the workplace. This could include layout, organisation of workflow, the efficacy of current policies and what new or adapted measures are necessary including shift systems, social distancing, shielding and innovative measures to enable work whilst reducing risk.

Whilst COVID-19 has no precedent, the implied hazards are not dissimilar to past experiences where our public safety framework and operating practices changed to manage new emergent risks. Past examples include changes made in clinical practice when dealing with HIV patients, in the nuclear sector following major incidents and the construction sector when confronting the asbestos threat. Have confidence that we can, and will, find ways of dealing with the latest public safety challenges in the workplace.

Transition to the new normal

I am Mark Bouch. I'm a strategy implementation and change consultant. My specific expertise is developing organisational leadership capability to cope with uncertain and dynamic business environments. It is clear to me we face a lengthy period of significant economic fallout. Many companies will be vulnerable during this period.  This is a prompt to revisit your pre-COVID strategy to ensure it is coherent and relevant in the post-COVID world.  I recommend a flexible and iterative approach designed to bridge the gap between today and the next period of ‘normal’, whatever that looks like. Looking at various points in time within this period you should build (then subsequently update) a realistic picture of the situation you expect based on current information.

Once you have an up-to-date common operating picture, you can then develop a range of scenarios describing possible future outcomes. Now stand back and describe, in terms that will be easily understood, your broad direction of travel based on your beliefs about what is likely to happen.  This provides a unifying purpose (or compass heading if you like) for your organisation given the post-COVID opportunities likely to be available and your organisation’s capability. 

Planning in this way enables your organisation to ‘screen’ existing initiatives against new scenarios, deciding whether they should stop, continue, or accelerate. Stopping activity is always tough but makes resources available for new priorities in response to a changing situation. It will also enable you to identify what is most important to your success in any situation, highlight areas of risk and understand what to look out for as the situation evolves. This type of dynamic planning process is essential to identify coherent near-term goals, keep the changing situation under review and adapt your plan as often as necessary.

Communications

Sheena Thomson is a crisis and issues communications consultant. She helps clients including EU, NATO and corporates identify, prepare, manage and recover from risk issues, disruptive events, incidents, news or crisis. Sheena’s advice is:

Successful implementation of even the best plans hinges on the people required to make things happen.  When you’re looking at returning to the post-lockdown workplace, it is crucial to fully understand and respond to individual perceptions of risk.  These perceptions are formed by government announcements, statistics, the current news and heavily influenced by underlying beliefs, fear and attitudes. 

The best initial communications approach is to first build and maintain awareness of a range of people’s attitudes and circumstances.  Understanding concerns and gathering ideas is the first step to building engagement, reinforcing trust and informing complex decisions involving risk and risk perception.  In this scenario, we live within a relentless 24-hour media cycle where the speed and spread of information (accurate or otherwise) can potentially derail the most well-thought-out and robust plan.  If you fail to engage people, non-experts, speculators, and people with alternative agendas will fill the gap.  

Knowing how employees, clients, customers, and contractors feel, understanding their beliefs and adjusting your communications is key, otherwise, people simply will not want to return to the workplace. Once you have this insight you can focus on developing an effective narrative:

•Identify the changes or new instructions, facts, and evidence to support why change is required.  

•Be mindful of tone – this is a human crisis, and some are likely to be directly impacted, so be empathetic.  

•Chose the appropriate delivery method for your organisation e.g. video team calls backed up by email, live stream, or existing internal comms platforms.

Finally, always ask for feedback.  As the situation develops you need feedback to adjust your responses - either your plans or your messages about them. 

Conclusion - work in progress!

We expect people leaders to take slow tentative steps towards restarting the workplace.  Although often tempting to ‘wait and see’, there is a compelling reason to move fast. In uncertain times, speed matters more than perfection. You must accept your plan will not be perfect, and it will rapidly outdated. You need a holistic approach balancing these three essential aspects (public safety, your transition to the ‘new normal’ and communications).

Many factors, including public perceptions of risk, will influence your decision to return to the workplace. Public safety is, of course, our primary concern but the debate must include the consequences of avoiding one set of risks, only to face more significant and damaging consequences in the future. If we were to use (a controversial) metaphor from ‘Jaws’: When will it be safe to go back in the water? The answer is when you have achieved a balanced approach serving business and society’s purpose, accepting and controlling appropriate levels of risk and engaging people effectively. With these approaches, returning to the workplace is very much Mission Possible.

References:

[1]  https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/our-plan-to-rebuild-the-uk-go...

[2]  https://www.gov.uk/guidance/working-safely-during-coronavirus-covid-19

[3]  Shortly after drafting this blog the BBC’s Health Correspondent published an excellent article about the risk titled Coronavirus: How scared should we be? Nick Triggle 24 May 2020.

About Leading Change

Leading Change is a specialised consulting practice devoted to organisational effectiveness. We help organisations to succeed in uncertain and dynamic business environments. www.leadingchangeuk.com

To find out more about the advisory services offered by David, Mark and Sheena, please contact Business West Initiative Member Mark Bouch, Managing Director of Leading Change.  

Look at our RESTART proposition or contact Mark at mark.bouch@leadingchangeuk.com

T: +44 (0) 203 170 8026

M: +44 (0)7979 227 686

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