“In 40 days and 40 nights
What has COVID-19 taught me”
4th May 2020
Since we locked our office doors on 20th March 2020, thinking it was home working for us all for probably 2 weeks, did I ever imagine that 40 days and 40 nights later, I would still be sat at my dining room table with my laptop, running the business operations remotely.
Remote working has become the new norm and video chatting has become the best technology ever! I was never one for hopping on FaceTime, but Microsoft Teams, Zoom and WhatsApp are my new best friends.
That has showed me that the world is massively connected and working from home has been productive, we can operate away from the office and stay in close contact with my colleagues, candidates and clients, with minimal issues.
But more so, these unprecedented times have taught me 5 valuable lessons.
1) That our wonderful NHS, Care Workers, Supermarket staff, deliverymen and -women and the many other essential workers are the ones that keep us going – I salute you all.
2) It has taught me that washing your hands and sanitising more, does actually work and that it does need to become more of a ritual to protect yourself and those around you.
3) Strangely this awful disease has taught us about a newfound respect & appreciation for one another and how precious time together is.
4) That we can survive on basics and 5) We can create our own entertainment and not to spend so much money on going out.
In a time when we recently slated the government for their poor Brexit system that took forever to negotiate and for many years believed the infrastructure of the NHS was a complete joke, they have both come out as the best institutes this country has.
It’s always a pleasure to work with the clients we have, but over the last 7 weeks, the nostalgia around “being in this together” has elevated these relationships and they are as strong as ever. When they too were adjusting to essential working guidelines in the workforce, we have all created new ways of working in a disaster recovery situation. I want to thank our clients and candidates for their business and patience and the opportunity to keep working when so many other recruitment companies have been really hit hard.
I would also like to personally thank our staff that moved into a furlough position with understanding and acceptance, this couldn’t have been easy for them to adapt in such uncertain times and thankyou to our consultants who continued to receive business and self-motivate to make sure service levels are met so our candidates and clients do not suffer. They have kept on top of their game in conditions they have never known. Some of an age that they have not even worked through a period of recession to even know what this current situation could possibly feel like.
As we approach the next announcement from Boris Johnson, we hope that we receive some positive news about the drop in cases and that with new social distancing rules clan be relaxed a little so we can come out of lockdown and get back into the office.
We are currently changing the layout of our office and creating a timetable to mix up home working with office working for the next few months so we continue to stay apart and to say that I have missed the team and the office environment is an understatement!
Continue to stay safe and well everyone.
Clare