The UK Government-led response to combatting COVID-19 has resulted in almost every business in the country having to take some pretty drastic measures. Whether that’s closing entirely due to a direct instruction from Boris Johnson, placing staff onto the Job Retention Scheme (JRS) in order to safeguard their roles for the future, or doing a quick about turn to change their focus to producing ventilator parts -it’s doubtful any firm is currently going about its ‘business as usual’.

Filtermist’s Director of Group Shared Services Jo Morris, shares her thoughts on the current situation and how our company is facing this monumental challenge:

“As a company that has a subsidiary in China, we had been monitoring the situation for a while, but even with that in mind the speed and enormity of the situation was, and remains to be, quite daunting. 

“We are lucky in that a number of our colleagues were already set up to work remotely when this issue first started to become apparent. We immediately instructed everyone that could work from home to do so and put measures in place to ensure this applied to as many people as possible. However, some jobs simply can’t be done from home, so we implemented changes to ensure people were maintaining the recommended ‘social distancing’ at all times. This included moving equipment, staggering break times and ensuring our mobile operatives travelled separately.

“As a business, we had already started using Microsoft Teams and this has been an invaluable tool throughout this period. All of our teams, including the Senior Management Team (SMT) hold regular video conferencing calls using this channel and so far, we have only had a positive experience of remote working.

“As the situation progressed and more details of the Government’s plans became clear, we took the decision to enter a number of colleagues onto the Job Retention Scheme in an effort to safeguard their roles for the future. Whilst many of our customers operate in critical industries such as food production, medical device manufacturing and pharmaceuticals, a large number of companies began stopping external contractors and even closing altogether.

“Our SMT decided the best course of action was to keep as many people working as necessary so that we can support our customers who have seen demand increase as a result of COVID-19 if required.

“From a HR perspective, having populations of our workforce in different places, some in quite significantly changed circumstances, some working and some not, has been a challenge to manage, but we are taking it day by day based on the events of the previous 24 hours. Our overriding objective throughout all of this is to keep the business going and to make sure our people are as informed as they can possibly be to try and alleviate some of the general anxiety around this issue.

“We are actively ensuring we are communicating with all furloughed employees so they can keep up to date with what’s going on in the business. However, we also have a number of people working from home for whom this is a new experience, and given the restrictions imposed by the Government we’re aware that some of this population may be feeling quite isolated.

“For this reason, we’re introducing a new weekly email entitled ‘Filtermist from Afar’. This email will be sent to all colleagues and will contain a mix of content including what people are up to in their time away from the business, unusual work spaces, home schooling tips, mental health advice and anything else we think might help put a smile on their faces and keep them feeling like they are part of the business.

“Many of our people have been employed by Filtermist for a long time, and our team camaraderie is highly valued throughout the company. We don’t want anything to threaten that so are working really hard to try and keep our people as engaged as possible so when they do come back it won’t be such a big step.

“This is a challenging time for everyone, but if we manage it well it offers an opportunity to strengthen our business by addressing areas that could be better, which are sometimes overlooked in the general day to day operations.

“Our HR department has a mantra ‘Get, Grow, Keep’ – we aim to attract the best people for the job, ensure we provide opportunities for them to develop their careers and by doing this we aim to keep them. Our people are our most valuable asset, and it is more important now than ever that we do whatever we can to help them through this period.”