The world is currently going through a challenging time with the disruption of the Coronavirus. People, families and businesses across the globe are all feeling the impact.

Our teams, clients and partners come first so we are doing what we can to support them during this time. From offering remote working, dispersing the teams, increasing cleaning routines and offering flexible working to do our small part in slowing the virus down.

We ask all our friends, clients and partners to do what they can – If you can offer remote working, or shifts to disperse teams, please consider it – If more businesses offered this (depending on business type), it would have a massive positive impact on slowing down the spread.

There is a lot of un-certainty, especially in the business world. With the change in working landscape and businesses forced to adopt working from home, many businesses are facing challenges they have never had to face before.

Many businesses are going into survival mode – Everyone and every business is different, but here are some tips on supporting the new way of working and changing your business into a thriving state.

How can my business thrive during Covid-19, not just survive?

Team Wellbeing – To get through this challenging time and to support others around you, your priority needs to be your team. Special attention needs to be made on how you can accommodate them with the changes, offer flexible/remote working and above all keep in close communication with them. Sudden changes and especially if you are not used to working from home can be a shock to the system, a hit to your routine and play havoc with anxiety.

Ensure you offer advice and support around routines and best practice to maintain a healthy and productive mind.

Security – With the increase in panic, comes the increase in threats. Hackers are taking advantage of the increased noise and increasing attacks via spam, phishing and ransomware.

Extra attention needs to be considered when it comes to users devices and data, and end user education on this subject should be carried out across the board.

We need to educate and protect our staff around these increased threats and provide them with the tech to support them. It is even more critical now to protect devices and applications to minimize risk from accidental data deletion, compliance oversight and ransomware attacks.

Technology – With the change of working practice and the segregation of team’s, technology and infrastructure will be one of the critical areas that businesses will need to review to stay ahead.

When leveraged correctly, technology and tools can allow for seamless communication and collaboration no matter the distance between teammates.

Many services, applications and tech can even boost productivity of teams and that will play a key role in shifting to a ‘thriving state’

What does the future look like?

How businesses operate and ‘do business’ will be changed forever. Life during a pandemic is challenging, but even after businesses will need to re-group and ask themselves some questions. How did we cope? How did the team cope? Did we have the tools and tech in place to maintain service? Did we remain secure throughout? The list goes on…

To thrive and to continue to grow during and after C-19, businesses need to re-invent themselves.

What technology can help with the new way of working?

There is a vast array of technology and applications that can support this shift in working practice. Here are the categories you need to explore to ensure you can maintain productivity, outcomes and thrive:

⦁ Video Conferencing - for example Microsoft TEAMS, ZOOM, and WEBEX etc..

⦁ Communication - for example Hosted Telecoms and Microsoft TEAMS etc...

⦁ Collaboration - for example Microsoft TEAMS, Office 365 and SharePoint etc...

⦁ Cyber Security - for Example Cyber Essentials, 2 Factor Authentication, Antivirus and encryption etc..

⦁ Productivity - for example Microsoft Project, Basecamp.com, Employee task management tools etc..

⦁ Cloud Infrastructure - For example hosted desktops, cloud servers and offsite backups etc...

How can I support my team working from home?

First and foremost, check-in with them as often as possible and ensure they are ok (Physically and mentally). It can be tough working remotely for long periods of time. Give your staff education and best working practice for maintaining a balanced life when working from home and how to care for their wellbeing. A healthy happy team is key to making this work.

Remember this is a new way of working and your teams and devices will be more vulnerable than ever. Give them the tools, software and training they need to stay safe online.

To bring everything together and to ensure your team are one unit (even when dispersed), this is where technology is going to play a key part. Whether its ensuring you can all communicate seamlessly via video chat, or share files as easily as in the office – Review your IT road map, and adapt to future proof your business.

How can my IT partner, IT team or Technology vendors help me?

The government understands that technology and infrastructure is what is needed to keep the cogs moving. IT, Infrastructure and Telecoms has just been registered as ‘key Workers’ in the current climate by the government.

Ensure you work closely with your IT team to make sure they understand your challenges, needs and concerns. They will be able to support the changes that are happening across the globe to ensure security is increased and technology leveraged to maintain productivity, especially with a dispersed team.

Technology vendors like Microsoft are offering extended trials of critical tools like MS TEAMS to allow businesses to increase communication and collaboration across remote sites and home workers. Ask your IT team and vendors to see what support they can offer during this time.

Let’s talk…

If you are concerned about the impact C-19 will have on your business, want advice on technology to support the new way of working, or just want a chat contact Mike Douglass – michael.douglass@yellowbus.uk

Wishing everyone all the best, stay safe!

The Yellowbus Team