Preparing for the return to work

Preparing for the return to work

While the official lockdown is easing, the return to workplaces is cautious and will come with substantial changes according to a new People Management poll. 

Of the 500 HR professionals surveyed, 55% believed staff would continue working from home. So far, only 4% of the employers had asked any staff to return to work since the change on 11 May. 24% were waiting for explicit guidance from the Government for its specific sector before changing their work-from-home regime.

In terms of post-pandemic plans, 67% plan to alter their workplace layout to help ensure social distancing (40% aim to promote back-to-back rather than side-to-side or face-to-face seating); 54% intend to stagger shift patterns; 53% fewer and shorter meetings. 19% will introduce temperature checking at entrances. Only 6% are considering the introduction of their own regular Covid-19 testing.

“Whenever the majority of employees eventually return to their workplaces, they are going to find themselves in a different environment, with different practices and routines,” says EAPA chair Eugene Farrell.

“We know from long experience that one of the most important sources of reassurance and comfort for people suffering from any form of psychological stress is a sense of normality. Being back at work. Chatting to colleagues. Falling back into comfortable routines with their little ups and downs. But this isn’t going to happen in any easy kind of way.

“In other words, going back to ‘normal’ work will be another jolt, a new realisation of the extent of the effects of the crisis. People will have to get used to more change and uncertainty before they can settle again.

“Under these circumstances, any existing worries, pressures from home or work, can be exacerbated. Nothing is so simple as dealing with one single issue – and that’s where EAPs come into their own, in unpicking knots of personal and work-related challenges and providing a breadth of knowledge and expertise to help people keep moving forward, to feel stronger and more secure in coping with each change and new development.”