4 Practical Steps to Get Your Business Up and Running, and Working Better

Every workplace will have a different tale to tell about how they got through the COVID-19 crisis, but there are several common themes that any company needs to address, at both the leadership and personal level, to get back up and running fast.

Ensure Staff Are Safe

There’s an armada of advice coming out from governments, advisory groups, unions, and health and safety experts. The simplest advice remains the best, requiring reopening plans to create plenty of space between workers, minimise interactions and keep all surfaces and contact points clean, while providing the necessary personal protection gear for particular roles.

One that is done, you need to ensure staff feel safe, taking emotional care of workers and ensuring no one feels pressured to come back to work, especially if they have been managing and functioning okay at home. The closer people are working together, through necessity, the greater the level of care and attention will be required.

Catch Up With the Backlog

Whatever company you work in, there is going to a mountain of post, a backlog of orders, deliveries and appointments to be caught up with. Much of this will have to be done manually, but the business restart represents an opportunity to investigate tools like robotic process automation (RPA) to automate the digitising of data and adding it to spreadsheets, databases or cloud productivity tools.

For customer interactions, a chatbot is a quick and easy tool to develop, using cloud apps like SnatchBot. They can handle queries while you are still down on staff numbers, and make reservations or book appointments while providing key updates about your business changes (opening hours, available staff and meetings) in a way that saves prospects or clients jamming your phone lines.

Improve Digital Skills and Resilience

When the workplace is starting to look and feel more like its old self, take the time to establish how every worker coped with being furloughed or working from home. Establish what the business could have done to make things better, from providing hardware or applications that work better.

Internally, look to see what pressures on servers or available bandwidth there was and expand these, or improve your provider deals. Check with IT staff to find out what issues and struggles they had and ensure the business can cope better in the future.

Finally, identify the people who had technology troubles and train them up over time to better digital workers, or find better applications for them to work with. Many workers found their old (personal or office-provided) laptops or tablets couldn’t cope with business apps or meeting tools, consider upgrading them.

Others may have been hit by the many scams or had trouble with security access, fake apps or services. Provide IT security and awareness training to help them understand the risks and ensure the business is secure against new threats that will emerge after the crisis.

Lead From the Front

Workers will be scared, nervous or may have family/social/financial considerations that impact their focus on any return to work. It is up to the leadership to deliver, calm, consistent and realistic goals, and adapt the business around a gradual return. Use team meetings, personal calls and discussions to guide and reassure.

For business considerations, leaders need to be on top of the business end of the restart, taking advantage of fresh funding/grants or finding other revenue streams. Smart leaders will look to adopt technology to speed up recovery and push into new services or markets, the virus demonstrated the value of AI, robots, drones and chatbots in helping drive recovery efforts, something that will speed their adoption across many business use cases.

With plenty of other companies facing the same challenges, be prepared to make use of your networks and business links to find new partners or work. Be ready to build contacts with rivals or aligned firms to create a stronger launchpad for future efforts. There will also be many businesses that fail to make a full comeback and there should be a focus on winning new business from failed, dormant or weaker rivals.

With a moment for pause, it can be time for the business to consider getting new minds involved in decision-making processes and bring new ideas to the table. Replacement and new staff or leaders should be hired on their ability to deliver change and flexibility as well as results.

Whatever your decisions, at every step, make safety the primary consideration with one eye on future success, using smart technology to give you greater punching power as the return to work gathers pace.