Updated - 18 March 2020
From today, our entire team is working from home until official advice recommends otherwise.
Since our inception almost 19 years ago, we’ve experienced our fair share of uncertain times. But never before can I remember a global event quite like the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic; an outbreak of such scale and complexity that advice and guidance is changing hourly.
We’ve designed our company to withstand periods of economic pressure. Our systems and processed are well-defined and enable remote working – many of our team have worked from home several times per week for the last couple of years.
Protecting the health of our team, their families and anyone else they come into contact with is our paramount concern. For this reason, and in addition to the general guidance from the NHS/PHE, from 12 March, we have:
- Allowed employees to work from home full time, if they choose, until further notice
- Encouraged greater use of flexible working hours, to avoid busy commuting times
- Postponed all international travel
- Minimised any visitors to our offices
- Minimised in-person meetings, at our offices or elsewhere, to “critical” only
- Chosen video conferencing to replace the above where possible
As the situation unfolds, we expect additional protective measures will be put in place. In the event of a major escalation, all team members will be able to work remotely.
How does this affect the work we do for you?
Our phones will continue to ring and be answered as normal. Email and online communication will continue as normal. If we need to close one of our offices, we know we can continue to operate as normal. Our business continuity plan has been reviewed and we stress tested this scenario last week.
Some of our clients are not familiar with distributed co-working, and we’re sharing guidance and information for those that need it.
Workshops that would normally be held in-person are being held remotely. We’ve experience doing this with our international clients, so it’s business as usual for us.
Our delivery and support teams – responsible for strategy, design, build, marketing, testing, account and project management, and support – have all the tools and expertise to continue to deliver their excellent work from home.
Internally, we’re communicating the latest, most accurate news to our team every day. Our business and team are well prepared.
For health information and advice, visit the NHS Coronavirus pages here: https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/coronavirus-covid-19/
If you are worried about coronavirus and how it could affect your life, Mind has provided lots of information to help here https://www.mind.org.uk/information-support/coronavirus-and-your-wellbeing/
If you’re new to working from home, there’s some good tips here: https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20200312-coronavirus-covid-19-update-work-from-home-in-a-pandemic
