2020 Workforce Planning: Coronavirus and Beyond - Machins ...
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2020 Workforce Planning: Coronavirus and Beyond
Background
The COVID-19 pandemic has created unprecedented challenges both societally and economically.
More than a fifth of the world’s population has been in lockdown, in a drastic attempt to minimise the
spread of Coronavirus1. This has, inevitably, had a significant impact on globalised supply chains and
economic systems – the full consequences of which remain to be seen.
The effects of lockdown have led the Bank of England to predict the worst economic downturn in 300
years2. While all employers will experience the effects of this downturn differently, with some even
enjoying an uptick in revenue if they are fortunate enough to provide ‘in-demand’ goods or services,
sadly many will experience declining sales revenues for some time to come.
In conjunction with lockdown, the World Health Organization has strongly recommended the
introduction of social distancing as a key measure to help limit the rate of disease transmission3, until a
vaccine has been found. In an effort to ‘flatten the curve’ of the virus, workers who can perform their
role from home have been urged not to travel to work. Those who cannot work from home have been
asked to try and limit their contact with others and to avoid public transport where possible.
Professor Chris Witty, the UK’s Chief Medical Officer, has indicated that social distancing measures will
be required until at least the end of 20204.
Ongoing social distancing requirements will have wide-reaching repercussions for how businesses
operate, even once lockdown measures are fully relaxed. Employers must, as a matter of urgency, take
steps to incorporate flexible and socially-distanced working arrangements into their organisations, for
the foreseeable future. UK Government has produced guidance for employers who are considering
reopening their workplaces.5 By adopting these guidelines, most employers will find that they cannot
continue to operate in the same way as they did before lockdown measures were implemented.
1
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/04/16/countries-in-lockdown-denmark-germany/
2
https://www.theguardian.com/business/live/2020/may/07/bank-of-england-interest-rates-covid-19-downturn-
us-job-losses-business-live
3
https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/advice-for-public
4
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/22/uk-will-need-social-distancing-until-at-least-end-of-year-says-
whitty
5
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/working-safely-during-coronavirus-covid-19
Page 1 of 6How organisations respond to the pandemic crisis in the months ahead will have significant
consequences for their own survival, and in tandem, for the longer-term recovery of the wider UK
economy.
This paper highlights a number of considerations for UK business leaders, that pose both challenges and
opportunities. We hope to kickstart a discussion about how business can emerge from lockdown
optimally. Employers will need to approach this from the viewpoint that the wider economic landscape
has changed irreversibly. The very nature of business itself must adapt to this new ‘nobody knows’
world. This requires embracing new ways of working to enable the best possible outcomes post-
Coronavirus.
Consideration 1: Changing work patterns and practices
Social distancing precautions will significantly impact the daily activities of most organisations.
Employers will need to ensure that social distancing measures comply with Government guidance, and
also that workers feel safe. Failures to do so could give rise to legal claims, so revisions to operating
practices must be robust. Employers should bear in mind that their obligation to provide a ‘safe’ working
environment will extend to taking ‘reasonable steps’ to prevent their workforce, customers and visitors
contracting coronavirus.
Changes to work patterns and practices should meet the needs of each individual employee. While
some workers will feel comfortable returning to a shared workspace, many others will not. As such,
while time-consuming, careful one-by-one consultations will ensure that no employee feels coerced into
a revised working practice that they don’t feel comfortable with personally.
On the upside, 2019 research data showed accelerating worker demand for flexible working6. Largely an
umbrella term, flexible working includes job-sharing, flexi-hours, compressed hours, a nine-day
fortnight, annualised hours, a four-day workweek7, and any number of permutations in between. It’s
increasingly clear that modern workers were, prior to the pandemic, on a quest for improved work-life
balance. The ability to offer flexible working arrangements was already emerging as a key bargaining
chip for employers seeking to attract top talent.
Growing demand for flexible working was already one of the primary trends set to shift the nature of
our complex relationship with work during the 2020s8. The pandemic has fast-tracked this trend,
bringing something that was forecast to play out over a number of years into a ‘here and now’ reality.
6
https://www.forbes.com/sites/joyburnford/2019/05/28/flexible-working-the-way-of-the-future/#4aea51e48745
7
https://www.forbes.com/sites/nextavenue/2020/02/06/the-4-day-workweek-has-its-time-come/#2c0e6a5551d0
8
https://ec.europa.eu/knowledge4policy/foresight/topic/changing-nature-work/developments-forecasts-
changing-nature-work_en
Page 2 of 6When crafted with care and consideration, revised work styles and patterns can help to cement ‘on-
demand’ agile working, improve staff retention and in turn, keep the UK economy working.
Progressive organisations looking beyond the pandemic, are likely to offer a variety of flexible working
options that optimally meet the complex and divergent needs both of customers and employees alike.
Lockdown has demonstrated that remote working can be successfully implemented, and that not all
workers need to be office-bound to be effective. The opportunity is to build on this in a way that
encourages organisational productivity and results.
In the short term, the introduction of flexible working options into the mainstream inevitably requires
investment in in-depth consultation with workers, employment contract renegotiations, and evolution
towards new leadership and management styles.
Over time, however, adaptation to flexible working patterns enables and facilitates organisational
agility, to meet emergent market demand.
Consideration 2: Changing workforce requirements
Prolonged social distancing requirements will inevitably impact core business activity in multiple
industry sectors. Sadly, this is likely to lead to a sharp rise in redundancies, as organisations are forced to
pivot business models and change the shape of their workforces to survive. It’s possible that the
government furlough scheme, which will remain available in some form until the end of October, may
help reduce the need to make redundancies. It’s unlikely however to remove it altogether.
Even for those businesses that don’t need to consider redundancies, the need to comply with social
distancing measures will mean that many offices cannot reopen to the same capacity of employees as
they did when the restrictions were imposed. As public transport will be unable to carry the same
number of commuters as it did before9, employees may not be able to get to work as easily as they did
previously.
Equally, as many employees have proven themselves to be able to successfully work from home over
the past few months, employers will find it increasingly difficult to argue for mandatory office-based
working once restrictions are eased.
These new realities drive the requirement for employers to consider alternatives to traditional office-
based models of employment. For progressive organisations, the options available here are thankfully
no longer binary.
Increased demand for flexible working may indeed offer a life-raft to many businesses and workers
alike. It makes little sense for organisations to shelve established and trusted talent, unless absolutely
9
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/coronavirus-london-underground-tube-buses-
overwhelmed-lockdown-report-a9491756.html
Page 3 of 6necessary. Flexible working contracts have the potential to offer a viable alternative to redundancy,
alongside the means by which to bounce back faster, organisationally, once the economy starts to
recover. A workforce that’s been invested in over the years and that has baked-in organisational
knowledge is a highly valuable asset.
Thoughtful consultation may well establish that employees hitherto on full-time employment contracts
are prepared to flex, and explore reduced hours contracts, in return for ongoing job security and the
opportunity to continue to be connected to an organisational ‘family’.
Exploring the viable employment alternatives to large scale redundancies is surely better for the
inevitable wider economic recovery.
Consideration 3: Changing workplaces
Evolution of work patterns, practices, and workforce numbers will naturally go on to alter the type and
size of space required by the modern workforce.
As organisations update working patterns and practices to accommodate continued social distancing,
and embrace agile working to better manage the ebbs and flows in customer demand, it becomes
inevitable that what we need from our physical workspaces will also change.
The first two decades of the 21st Century saw a shift away from office cubicles towards open-plan
workspaces. Hot-desking also became popular (if perhaps less so with those who were expected to work
that way). But few of these trends were grounded in any behavioural science behind optimal workforce
productivity.
And as the type of work we do has evolved, it turns out that we need a variety of different spaces for a
variety of different work activities. Just as the makeup of the 21st Century workforce is complex and
diverse, so too is the kind of space required for the different kinds of thinking that goes into 21st Century
work.
After the enforced period of remote working, it’s entirely feasible that many organisations will seek to
continue home-working wherever possible, in a bid to reduce cost. But making such decisions purely
based on cost is short-sighted.
The more ambitious organisation will analyse the types of work undertaken within its operations, and
design workspace around that. Since continuous product and service innovation, and complex problem-
solving, are predicted to be key activities for sustained organisational resilience, it makes perfect sense
to design workspaces that enable design-thinking activities to flourish.
Natural daylight, acoustics, air quality, biophilia – 21st Century workspaces are increasingly designed for
optimal wellbeing, which of course has a positive effect on engagement and productivity.
Page 4 of 6Creating shared spaces that potentially respect ongoing social distancing measures, embrace workforce
neurodiversity, and the evolving types of work being undertaken by humans in the modern age, will
accelerate long-term organisational performance.
Consideration 4: The psychology of change
It’s impossible to say how long it will take to find a viable vaccine to protect against COVID-19. For as
long as the virus remains a threat to human life, our day-to-day existence will continue to be ‘post-
normal’.
Businesses and organisations are, at their most simple, representations of group collective endeavour.
How we adapt, individually and collectively, to uncertainty as a constant will underpin our future
successes.
Many of the challenges that lie ahead are as yet unknown. They’re certainly likely to be multiple and
varied. Viable 21st Century businesses will need help to embed human behaviours that support ongoing
change, as we continuously adapt to rapidly evolving marketing contexts.
Successful organisational leadership in the 21st Century will look very different to anything that has
preceded it. The size, scope and complexity of the challenges that lie before us will require new
competencies that support and encourage collective intelligence. Business resilience will come from the
contribution of the many human collaborators within an organisational ecosystem.
Team and workforce dynamics - how to maximise human potential for enhanced performance and
results - will be a primary topic of boardroom conversation in the coming years.
Identifying, embracing, and embedding the new business competencies will require sustained effort.
Successful cultural change takes time. Fortunately, we have at our disposal all that’s been learned in the
past twenty years about human neuroscience, psychology, behavioural economics, and socio-cultural
and technological shifts. Smart businesses will leverage these insights to their organisational advantage
as part of their efforts to extrapolate an interpretive bridge to the future.
Page 5 of 6What can we conclude from all of this?
The pandemic has turned business upside down in short order. How business leaders respond and adapt
to very different trading conditions in the months ahead, will impact on our society and economy for
generations to come.
If the past weeks have shown anything, it’s that UK business is about more than simply maximising
revenues. Brand reputations have already crashed and burned on the initial responses to the pandemic.
Similarly, some businesses have gained huge social reverence by pivoting to support the NHS.
The long-term recovery of our country will depend on an altogether more holistic and reasoned
approach to business, and its role within the fabric of our society.
However, business leaders should consider that the solution to their success post-coronavirus is likely to
come from their own initiative rather than a centralised top-down roadmap. Each business will need to
consider the specific factors relevant to their market positioning, to devise a strategy that works for
them, their employees, and their customers. Those with their eyes on the horizon, and ‘foresight focus’
will succeed. Those who fail to embrace the new market dynamics will struggle.
At a societal level, work provides routine, structure, and boundaries – three things that promote human
wellbeing. Good work also provides us with a sense of connection, belonging and purpose. The idea that
we’re each part of something bigger has sustained civilisations over millennia.
How we work, lead, and optimise our organisations is on the cusp of dramatic transformation. We hope
this paper encourages some thoughtful consideration of the path ahead. Those organisations that have
the foresight to see beyond the constructs of traditional business operations, and adapt accordingly, will
weather what downturn lies ahead. Those that don’t adapt will struggle.
We’re here to help you embark on your transformation journey. For a complimentary discussion and
ideas on how to get started, please contact:
Working the Future Machins Solicitors
We help UK businesses in the areas of: We provide specialist legal advice and assistance
to both businesses and individuals, including:
• Foresight focus and business intelligence
• Organisational / cultural / behavioural • Employment Law
change • Commercial Property
• 21st Century workforce planning and
• Company and Commercial
optimisation
Web: www.workingthefuture.com Web: www.machins.co.uk
E: Cathryn@workingthefuture.com E: David.rushmere@machins.co.uk
M: 07788 718823 Tel: 01582 514370
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