In the UK, Boris Johnson is keen for everyone to return to work if it is safe to do so. But how confident are you in taking the plunge? Are you ready to leave your protected environment and embrace public transport?
As a global company, we need to ensure we work within the guidelines set out by governments in the various jurisdictions our offices are located in. Most importantly, we need to make sure our teams feel confident and can thrive in the environments they work in. At Brady, we feel it’s important to offer choices and accommodate individual needs at this unusual time.
We’re very lucky as a company that, even before COVID, we were very well set up to operate remotely (as detailed in our May blog post by our Head of IT). Working with differing employees’ situations and individual risk appetites is something we are managing to accommodate well.
A great quote relating to these unusual times is from Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, Entrepreneur, and MD of Biocon Limited. Kiran says, “Ultimately, the greatest lesson that COVID-19 can teach humanity is that we are all in this together.” We share a similar sentiment here at Brady in our approach to supporting our employees and customers alike.
Back in June, we asked our London and Cambridge-based teams to complete our ‘Return to office’ survey. This survey produced some really interesting results. Some people were keen to return to the office as soon as possible, others wanted to return when school returns, and for some who may be in the higher at risk category or have family members that are, returning to the office was not feasible.
For London-based employees, overwhelmingly the main concern was catching public transport. For Cambridge, it was mostly about safety and whether they could realistically work and be socially distanced. One cheeky employee responded saying their main worry was about not having enough biscuits in the office!
Despite doing our best to stay close to each other virtually during these strange times, for some, nothing beats face-to-face human interaction. It seems a new tradition has been born in the London office with ‘socially distanced wine Wednesdays!’.
For those that do feel comfortable returning to the office, we have made efforts to ensure our employees can do so safely. We’ve put up signs reminding people of room capacity, plenty of hand sanitizer dotted around the office and our Office Manager made some lovely ‘return to the office’ packs.
On behalf of the Brady team, we wish our blog followers well as we continue to navigate our way through this crisis.
