Best Practices and Guidance on Restart for Employers in Ohio

Ok... #Restart... Kind of... Let's talk about the process and the liability:

First, the here is the guidance from Governor DeWine:

• Friday, May 1st - Elective Outpatient Surgeries can start again (which will really help the revenue for our #healthcare providers).
• Monday, May 4th - Distribution, Manufacturing and Construction can resume.
• Monday, May 12th - Retail and Service based businesses can resume.

Since #Covid19 is still present in #Ohio, these dates are contingent on the following provide Covid-19 cases decline (which hasn't happened yet):

1. No Mask, No Work, No Service, No Exceptions
2. Every employer should conduct a daily health assessment on each employee.
3. Continued emphasis on hygiene and hand washing.
4. Clean and disinfect office, workspace and surfaces daily.
5. No more than 50% of fire capacity allowed in a building and employers should maintain 6' of social distancing while working.

We are hearing from many employers that, beyond the guidance from the Governors plan, there are a few things left to be considered by each employer:

How Are Your Employees Feeling?

While we all know we need to get back to work eventually, many employers are examining the relative risk of their employees and their employees feelings about going back into the office. If your team is younger and without preexisting conditions, you are likely to be on the leading edge of the date guidance by the governor. If your workforce is higher risk, we see employers lagging and extending work from home #wfh policies. The fact that the overwhelming majority of employers are gauging their employees feelings around the restart shows how much those employers care about their people.

Physical Working Environment

When looking at the physical working environment of your office, it's important to not only look at the desk set up but also the entry, exit and common areas. Does your office set up lend to social distancing? If not, you may want to have barriers installed. We are also hearing from businesses that share lobbies, elevators, and bathrooms with other companies such as multi-tenant office buildings. The trend is these businesses are going to be slower to restart. The reason these businesses are being cautious is that they are able to control their own space and check their own employees they have no control over the other businesses in the building.

Split Shift Scheduling

Many employers are dividing their workforce into teams. For all employees who are low risk, employers are likely to be asking their employees to work from home and come into the office on a regular rotating schedule. For example, Week 1 of the month may have 50% of the workforce in the office and 50% working from home. On Week 2, the group that worked from home would be in the office and vise versa. We also see many employers splitting their departments equally between the teams. Example - 50% of customer service on team 1, 50% on team 2.

Continued Work from Home at Scale

For high risk individuals or for those employees who can achieve efficiency from home, employers are continuing the WFH guidelines. This limits the employee's risk of contracting Covid-19 and maintains continuity in the business. We are also seeing a few businesses that are slower right now continue to work from home until the work volume comes back.

Still, with all of this guidance, there is a great deal of uncertainty and concern for the future. Guidance from corporate attorneys illustrate great risk for employers who don't follow the best practices and even for employers who do.

What happens if you don't make every effort to keep your employees safe? Walmart is currently involved in a wrongful death lawsuit. See more information here: https://abcnews.go.com/Business/walmart-hit-wrongful-death-lawsuit-employee-dies-covid/story?id=70040675

Every business is trying to make the best decisions for their business and their people. While this is a time of unprecedented change, we are seeing great leadership out of our state Government and our great Ohio businesses.

Have additional ideas or best practices? I'd love to hear about it! You can reach me at 513.448.5592 or [email protected]

Aquarius is a Cincinnati Home Grown staffing partner to some of the largest companies in the region. Founded in 2006, Aquarius has active pipelines in IT, Accounting, Operations, Finance, Marketing, Engineering, Clerical, Human Resources, Transportation, Administrative, Customer Service, and Beyond. Being client driven, Aquarius prides itself on its flexibility to consistently deliver value to its clients. We feel it's our ability to deliver value that makes us a partner not just a vendor. Aquarius has the bandwidth to support Direct Hire, Contract-To-Hire, Non Time Defined Contract or Special Projects.