It’s safe to work we go

PRODUCED IN PARTNERSHIP WITH UK GOVERNMENT

There may be only one thing trickier than managing to live under lockdown – and that is returning to normal work routines, as the country must now do.

For the vast majority of independent retailers this subject will be of some professional interest. Having been open for the most part throughout the last few months, the shopkeepers of Britain have already become practiced in many different variations of operational safety at work – and in expertly regulating social distancing while hundreds of customers visit their stores every day.

In fact, about half of the country – the bus drivers and nurses, food and factory workers, garbage collectors and police, firefighters and postal workers – never ceased turning up at work regardless of the risks and dangers.

Likewise, they too are also well-qualified to help the rest of us back to work safely thanks to the systems they have devised and improvised since March.

All these people have already proved that working safely while the coronavirus is still around is perfectly possible.

But it is understandable how some people, such as the old or those with medical conditions, are terrified of going outside, while others – young, healthy – have little care for risks and are impatient to return to normal.

They will all have to work together – so how can we do it? How can we make those two perceptions of reality fit?

(SUBHEAD) Top Travel Tips

The first thing to remember is that you have to be safe getting to work before you can be a safe at work. Travelling is also the period when, unless you are in your own vehicle, you are most likely to be in a relatively crowded space.

To deal with the problem, Transport for London has suspended tapping in with Oyster cards on buses to limit surface contamination. Britain’s rail network meanwhile is putting in place comprehensive new measures to ensure social distancing and prevent crowding.

Train operators have introduced one-way systems at stations, floor markings, and extra security staff for crowd control. Some seats have been taped off and strict cleaning measures are in place.

Peter Hendy, Chairman of Network Rail, said most people were following social distancing rules. “Our passengers are reasonable and rational. I think people understand they don’t want to be too close to people,” he said.

The new measures we have all learned over the past months apply to daily travel:

• Wear a mask if there are people around you within the two-metre social distance – highly likely on a bus or train
• Leave a space between seats if you can. Rush hour can make this difficult, but employers are expected to be flexible in allowing employees to alter work hours to enable commuting out of “peak crush” times
• Try not to touch any surfaces or your face when you are aboard any transportation, and apply hand sanitiser immediately when you disembark
• Once at your place of work wash your hands really well
• And if you can, carry on working at home for as long as it is practical

You are good to go!

Like you’ve never been gone

“It feels so good to be back in the office” is a sentence many people thought they would never speak, and yet more and more are now impatient to return to their regular routines.

At Tilda in Rainham, Essex, they never stopped milling rice through the entire pandemic period. Head of external Affairs, Jon Calland, explained how the company did it and gave valuable pointers for managing Britain’s mass return to work.

“We are operating with a skeleton staff, and we have been milling rice 24/7. There’s been a huge increase in demand – it was unprecedented,” he says.

“What happens now is that we have staggered shifts, and the way handover is done minimises contact. So, we will make sure that in the canteen that not everybody is eating at the same time – that can’t happen anymore. The employees can all see that things are being done for their benefit.”

As well as procedural measures, Tilda has deployed some excellent technical ones: “We have temperature control,” says Jon. “If you come on site and you are running a temperature, you can’t come in. Those sorts of thing remind people that it’s a different situation now, and that you don’t come to work if you are ill. There’s no ‘being a trooper’.”

With these measures in place – Tilda also carries additional deep cleaning and disinfecting of all areas as a precaution – Jon says that the number of absentees Tilda has seen during the pandemic has been below average. “I think in any case in the food industry we have procedures in place that means it’s already a hygienic environment anyway. In terms of the product, nothing changed. It was in terms of the employees and needing to keep them apart.”

It’s worked well, he affirms, and the employees appreciate and cooperate despite the inconvenience. “The impression I have is that they felt that the company was pro-actively doing things, whether it’s putting markers on the ground – they know what two metres looks like, we’ve got that going round the building. We’ve got engineers and they think in terms of processes, and they were immediately thinking, ‘What can we do?’ It was really a collaborative effort.”

Welcome back!

Meanwhile, some companies have shuttered their premises for a few months and are now finding routes back to full trading. One was food chain Pret A Manger, which has already boldly reopened more than 100 shops, with safety and social distancing measures to protect its employees and customers.

“We initially reopened 10 shops in London, to help give frontline healthcare workers better access to freshly prepared food while also getting our supply chain up and running again to deliver food to those who need it most,” says Pret’s UK managing director Clare Clough. That move was followed by a further 20 shops a week later, all for takeaway and delivery only. “This gradual process has helped us reach a point where we now have 100 shops open across the country, in line with government guidance. Similar to supermarkets and other big shops, Perspex screens have been fitted at the tills and customers are encouraged to pay by card.”

Pret’s behind-the-scenes innovations could prove a template for foodservice as the industry ramps up again.

“We’ve introduced operational changes in our kitchens, including a nominated ‘kitchen runner’, who gets the products needed for each team member doing food preparation, in order to minimise the amount of movement in the kitchen,” explains Clough. “There are limited benches for food preparation, all spaced apart, while other restrictions are in place which allow only one person in certain areas of the kitchen at any one time.”

Helping them helping you

Northern wholesaler Parfetts has earned plaudits during the lockdown for keeping its prices steady and the shelves of its independent-retailer customers stocked.

The company has managed this partly by establishing safety protocols at its depots in places such as Halifax and Middlesbrough.

Parfetts has increased deep cleaning in depots for the safeguarding of its customers and staff and has rigorously followed government guidelines. Professional security teams have been employed to support staff across the estate.

Parfett’s success has been assured by the close bonds between workers and management – the wholesaler is employee-owned – and its concern for its retailer clients

“To date, I couldn’t be prouder of our colleagues and how the whole company has reacted in these unprecedented times,” Greg Suszczenia, Joint Managing Director, said. “Our customers are in the heart of communities. The overwhelming majority [of our people] know many of their customers by name, and I continually hear heart-warming stories.”

It is important for employers to encourage their workforce as well as being flexible over hours. It helps to maintain safety standards if people can be made enthusiastic about where they work.

Parfetts recognised the extraordinary effort of its people by bringing forward the July staff bonus payment to 9 April and paid it out at its maximum level.

Here we go

The pandemic situation in the UK is now improving – rapidly – with each passing day. We all want to get our lives and our economy back. With safety measures in place as we return to work and normality, we can speed the process further.

Denmark has already sent children back to school and halved social distancing to a metre with no apparent ill-effects. In Germany friends are eating together indoors at restaurants.

Elsewhere, in distant places such as Vietnam and Hong Kong, there have been remarkably few coronavirus deaths, and life has carried on almost as normal throughout the pandemic.

How could this possibly be? Because they had safety systems in place ready to use after earlier experiences with SARS and other viruses that hit them far harder than us.

Let’s learn from them not to worry about the last wave of the virus but to be alert and practical – let’s prepare to fight and win against the next wave or the next disease whenever it comes.

Return safely to work with the benefit of your experience, your new skills, and your alertness.

Britain is coming back.