It’s been time for decisions more than ever before

THIS past two weeks I’ve had to make more decisions than I have ever made. And they are such important calls to make; decisions that affect people’s lives — our people’s health, our clients’ health, our clients’ businesses.

The most important thing has been communicating to staff and clients about what has been happening and how we’ve responded. Early last week we had our first case in one of our four campuses. We sent everyone home, did a deep clean and closed the office for a couple of days. We went through all the people they had been in contact with and had them self-isolate, and communicated with all the clients they’d met.

The plan was to open the office again on Monday but then the advice from government suddenly changed. From “wash your hands” it went to “work from home if you can”.

By then, we had more people showing symptoms, clients had staff showing symptoms as well and we realised we had to recommend that everybody work from home.

We kept our buildings open until Tuesday night but then closed them all except our place on Chancery Lane.

It’s been so-full on as we pivot to a new way of working that we’re only just looking at how our revenues are going to be affected. Will this hit our clients and what they need to do? Yes, of course it will.

But there will be an upturn at some point and advising clients how to handle that is really important. Plus, the way they behave as a brand in a crisis like this will be crucial to their perception longer term.

Has it been a stressful time? Well, I will say I have slept a little less lately but we will all be OK in the end. Keep smiling and stay well.

⬤