COVID-19

Return to Work Considerations

April 2020
COVID-19: While all six areas of response at the left need to be
addressed to appropriately manage the COVID-19 crisis
How to prepare, respond and and recovery, evaluating when and how to gradually
bring employees back to the workplace represents
emerge stronger one of the most critical challenges your organization will
need to solve for.

PwC identifies six areas of It is a complex problem with many questions to consider:

response: “How can we ensure the health and “How should we sequence and pace
safety of our people?” the ramp up?”
Crisis
Management Workforce
“Are workers comfortable returning to the “How can we best generate revenue in
workplace? Do we even return?” the wake of COVID-19?”

“What are the unique considerations for “What will it cost to appropriately
Operations &
each country, city, site?” bring people back to work?”
Tax & Trade
Supply Chain

Health & Safety

Type of Work
PwC weighs return to work decisions (Sequencing)
Finance & Strategy &
Liquidity Brand across four decision criteria: Financial
(Cost & Revenue)

Worker Needs / Preference

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Decision criteria, applied as part recovery readiness,
informs the return to work (RtW) transition plan
Managing through crisis Prepare for return to work
Most companies have already pivoted to a ‘new normal’, which Mobilize a RtW task force and set up Transition Office to review response
includes the following workforce dimensions 1 effectiveness to date, scenario plan for key decisions, define and manage
action plan.
Responding to the Crisis: Protecting People
Lead with responsive, empathetic communications and policies
Key decision criteria RtW Transition Plan

Ensuring Work Gets Done: Secure & Productive Work

Health & Safety Mobilization

Mobilize
New ways of working and new forms of connectivity

Transition Office
Managing Liquidity: Workforce Cost Management Type of Work
Assess short and long-term workforce cost levers to plan for (Sequencing)
sustainability Operations

Preparing for Recovery: Recovery Readiness Financial Facilities

Transition Plan
Prepare for increased demand via workforce planning and (Cost & Revenue)
strategy Health & Safety
Worker
Purpose-Led Communications Needs / Preference Change Management
Increased frequency, new modalities of multi-stakeholder communication
and leadership engagement

1. More detail on the dimensions of work by which companies are already managing through
crisis is available in the appendix or on PwC’s COVID-19: Workforce considerations page

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There are four key decisions to be made prior to bringing
back subsets of the workforce
Financial
Health & Safety Type of Work Worker Needs /Preference
(Cost & Revenue)

Ensure compliance with local,

Identify jobs that require in- Understand costs incurred or Assess workers’ attitudes
state and federal laws and
1 1 person interaction with other 1 saved by bringing people back to 1 towards health and hygiene in
guidelines, including privacy
people (on-site or field) work (e.g., cleaning fees) the current climate
considerations

Identify and stand up new Understand worker personal

Identify jobs that require in-
Establish a sanitary work revenue streams or expand 2 situations (e.g., childcare,
2 2 person interaction with 2
environment existing offerings (e.g., new financial)
technology or machinery
products/services)

Establish medical protocols to Evaluate comfort with remote

Understand where risk and Plan for fluctuations in typical working and perceived
manage a returning workforce 3
3 3 compliance issues are magnified 3 business demand during the effectiveness of collaboration
(e.g., anonymized temperature
if jobs are not managed on-site COVID-19 recovery period tools/remote ways of working
checking)

Revisit and update proper Assess where productivity

4 environment, health and safety 4 decreases significantly if work is
(EHS) and emergency protocols performed off-site

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 COVID-19

Return to Work Considerations: Client Case

April 2020
We help our client to structure the process to identify
measures for different return to work scenario’s and we
manage their process to make these measures operational

Responding to the Crisis: Protecting People

Lead with responsive, empathetic communications and policies
Client’s demand:

Ensuring Work Gets Done: Secure & Productive Work • Set up realistic scenario’s for returning to work
New ways of working and new forms of connectivity
• Set up a framework of aspects (key decision criteria) which are
Managing Liquidity: Workforce Cost Management
Assess short and long-term workforce cost levers to plan for relevant for the client’s business
sustainability
• Identify the measures which can be taken per aspect to ensure
Preparing for Recovery: Recovery Readiness
Prepare for increased demand via workforce planning and
a safe return to work scenario
strategy

• Organise a structured way of implementing these measures.

Purpose-Led Communications
Increased frequency, new modalities of multi-stakeholder communication
and leadership engagement

1. More detail on the dimensions of work by which companies are already managing through
crisis is available in the appendix or on PwC’s COVID-19: Workforce considerations page

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There are five focus areas to be addressed to ensure a safe
and effective office return
Focus areas Description and example measures
• Understand worker personal situations (e.g., childcare, financial, risk factors) and define flexibility criteria for working
Staff individual remotely
health and safety • Establish clear guidelines around quarantining and thresholds where self-isolation is mandated
• Evaluate comfort with remote working and perceived effectiveness of collaboration tools/remote ways of working

• Ensure compliance with local, state and federal laws and guidelines, including privacy considerations
• Establish a sanitary work environment and medical protocols (e.g. anonymized temperature checks)
Staff at the office:
• Provide health toolkits for staff at the entrance of the office and other safety measures such as: non-touch soap
health and hygiene
dispensers, disinfectant at desks and public areas, plexiglass at entrance desk and intensified cleaning schemes
• Brief returning work force with for instance mandatory e-learning ‘working at the office’ in the new situation

Organisation of the • Identifying crucial activities for which working at office is necessary (e.g. high impact productivity, compliance risks)
work • Identify jobs that require in-person interaction with other people (on-site or field), technology or machinery

• Promote travelling by car or bike, possibly arrange more parking lots, create 1.5m distance rules in parking areas
• Making workplaces 1.5m social distance proof: show explicit the desks you can use and the desks you cannot use
Logistics to and at • Used of conference rooms by a limited number of persons: remove chairs from these rooms
the office • Create rules for walking logistics in the office such as one way traffic for paths and stairs and max 2 persons per elevator
• Pre-prepared lunches delivered in restaurant and eating lunch at own desks, other office facilities closed (e.g. coffee bar)
• Create visitor rules for instance approval required of physical need of visitor attendance and max number per meeting

Work location • If necessary, improve physical workplace at home (e.g. chair, screen, keyboard)
optimalisation • If necessary improve software and use of digital meetings

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 We suggest a four step Return-to-Office approach to
successfully manage the office return
Four step RtO approach
1 2 3 4
Create framework Define RtO measures Organize decision making Implement RtO measures

1  Mobilize internal RtO team  Determine employees  Discuss the RtO protocol  Create implementation plan
(task force) which need to be involved with management for agreed measures
 Conduct brainstorm to in rollout  Finalize the RtO protocol together with relevant
define the base principles,  Kick-off meeting to discuss and included measures employees
aspects (focus areas) and objectives, principles and  Align decision making on  Implement and coordinate
scenarios on which way-of-working each scenarios with Crisis measures (e.g. signage in
framework is build  Host ‘pressure cooker Management Team office, sanitizers etc.)
 Fill framework with sessions’, colleagues can  Monitor effectiveness of
implications and actions for raise relevant aspects and measures and adjust and/or
the different aspects per potential measures for their define additional measures
scenario respective function if needed
 Get sign-off on filled  Combine input and create
framework (optional) concept decision making
document (RtO protocol)

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