Over the past year, working conditions have changed for many companies – some significantly and some not so much. Hybrid, remote and flexible working have become more common and, in the times, when full countries were locked down, businesses moved to an entirely remote working environment.
What we are now seeing as a result, is organisations taking a closer look at their company culture as a whole and introducing wellbeing days/weeks for one of two reasons. Many companies are introducing wellbeing weeks to avoid staff ‘burning out’ after what has been a stressful year and a half. Others are using such days as a reward for hard work over the last 18 months. Just last month, Nike announced their plan to give employees in their corporate offices a week off to avoid ‘burnout’.
While giving your staff a week-day or week to work from home is in the interest of their own mental and physical wellbeing, promoting this and speaking openly about when your office will be closed may not be a good idea. Security should have been a top priority when offices were closed for long periods of time during lockdown and now many organisations are back to an office-based setup, it is just as important to maintain these levels of diligence. This will be particularly helpful during larger office closures throughout the year.
We already know that many organisations opt for collective annual leave weeks/fortnights, in which the entire staff are required to take time off at the same time. This doesn’t work for every business but for some, it means clients are made aware of the upcoming closure in advance, no work is handed over to other members of the team and annual leave is somewhat controlled and the likelihood of various members of the team being out of the office at the same/different times, is kept to a minimum.
We’ve spoken before about the potential risks of promoting this closure and wellbeing days / weeks are no different. While it is important to communicate this to trusted clients and partners, promoting this on social channels for example, could be detrimental.
It is therefore important that the security measures you have in place are effective both year-round and during sporadic office closures.
Any time of office closure should be carefully thought out and managed – consider these tips below
- Establish a flexible working arrangement with a trusted security company
- Ensure they have a reactive , 24/7 service so if something does happen when the office is closed they can manage everything for you
- Have a remote helpdesk arrangement who can handle issues when you are not around
- Don’t burden managers with more duties, they have enough to do managing COVID related staff and operational issues – outsource your requirements to a trusted partner
- Have your CCTV monitored but ensure they can react as well
While it is encouraging to see companies taking their employee’s welfare into consideration, the security risks remain, and the above measures are just a few you may want to consider during a full closure of your premises. However, when it comes to security, it’s best to have an efficient strategy and trying to put measures in place last minute could result in errors. Install measures which offer high levels of security 365 days a year AND cover you during office closures.
Get in touch today to assess your needs.