Author: Pamela Swift

Covid has slowed down business for all kinds of companies. It can be incredibly frustrating to look at all of the unused space on which you are paying a mortgage or rent. The last thing you may think to do is spend any more money right now. 

When business inevitably opens up again, you need to be competitive. Here are some ways to improve your business now, while business may be slower than other times. 

Examine your Business Expenses

This is a pretty logical step to take during a slow time. If you aren’t busy making money, now is a good time to make sure you aren’t bleeding out money anywhere. Look into employee activity reports, office expenses, vehicles, and other areas of your business to find anywhere that money is being wasted.

Redesign Your Office

If you aren’t planning on doing away with the brick-and-mortar building altogether, it’s important that the office that reopens for business is designed well. This is a great chance to make changes to workspaces, ensure that your office design is in line with company values, and get rid of excess furniture that may be cluttering things up. A superb design company like Key Interiors can help you to revitalize your office more affordably than you may expect.

Look for New Business Opportunities

Covid has changed the world in some ways that are temporary and some that may be permanent. Flexible and adaptable businesses are much more likely to survive slow periods. 

Take the opportunity while Covid is slowing you down to examine how your business functions and see if there are any places for you to create a new product or develop a new service to meet changing needs. 

Can current factory equipment be repurposed to make masks, sanitizer, or other high-demand products? Can deep cleaning services or home workforce management be added to the services your company performs? 

Look for ways to expand your business to meet changing demands. 

Take Advantage of Slow Times

It’s very tempting to put your head in the sand as you wait for Covid-19 to pass and business to pick up, but by being creative and making use of your downtime, you can make improvements that will make your company more successful when business picks up.

Companies are learning to create enhanced systems to keep everyone safe from Covid. Some of these systems including using products that can be introduced into the work environment and others are more procedural adjustments. Used in combination, they can create a work environment that’s secure to enter and work inside. 

Here are some Covid-Safe Systems worth employing in the workplace. 

• Entrance Procedures

When anyone enters the building, they need to go through appropriate Covid-Safe procedures to avoid endangering anyone on the premises.

Floor Decals and Signs

Use floor decals, signs, and people there to assist them to advise what to do. The addition of signs and floor indicators for where to stand or stop for inspection help to reinforce the procedures for people unfamiliar with them. 

Check for Temperature Abnormalities

It’s expected that anyone visiting an office shouldn’t have a temperature. Checking for this using a zero-contact temperature reader is the best idea. This can screen for people who should be asked to quarantine or avoid entering the building due to an elevated temperature reading.

Face Masks and More

Wearing a face mask and washing the hands before entering the main work area is necessary too. 

While a face mask might be removed when sitting in front of a plexiglass screen, otherwise wearing one helps to avoid the potential for spreading Covid to people nearby. 

Also, handwashing prevents accidentally spreading germs through surface contact. 

• Protective Screens Between Work Areas

One item of personal protective equipment that’s worth investing in is a protective screen. These are usually freestanding and create a visible separation between one space and another. 

These types of plexiglass screens are designed to prevent the free movement of air particles from one zone to the next. They can be used to separate one desk from another. Also, in a retail environment or a reception desk at an office, they can create useful separation between staff and visitors or shoppers. 

Additionally, they can also encourage better social distancing through a forced system, rather than relying on everyone remembering to do it. Just the presence of the screen is a visual reminder to keep distancing. 

• Separating Workspaces and Seating Areas

Part of social distancing means separating workspaces to place them further apart than they’d normally be.

Space Out the Desks

For some office environments, this will create a space restriction where the office isn’t large enough, but large office space is unaffordable.

Using remote working or working from home for certain employees – ideally as many as possible – can resolve this issue. This way, only the high priority staff who benefit from working from the office should do so. 

Reconfigure the Reception Area and Reconsider Meetings

For seating areas like in a reception or a staff meeting room, it’s preferable to intentionally space out the chairs to allow for greater social distancing. In this situation, face masks should be worn because the distance will be less than normal.

Also, companies running in-person meetings should avoid cramming people into a private office due to the risks of doing so. Use larger office spaces, speak outside, or switch to other means of communication.

By using the above-layered approach to creating a Covid-Safe work environment, anyone on the premises will be immeasurably safer than they would be otherwise. At a time when millions of Americans are being infected, companies cannot be too careful.