Post-Covid Business Failures: Lessons in Employee Trust -How Business Units Have Failed Employees and Organizations
Andre Ripla PgCert
AI | Automation | BI | Digital Transformation | Process Reengineering | RPA | ITBP | MBA candidate | Strategic & Transformational IT. Creates Efficient IT Teams Delivering Cost Efficiencies, Business Value & Innovation
The Covid-19 pandemic brought unprecedented challenges to businesses and workers around the world. As lockdowns were implemented and economies ground to a halt, companies had to drastically alter their operations just to survive. Employees were forced to quickly adapt to new remote work arrangements without adequate preparation or support from their employers.
Now, over two years since the World Health Organization declared Covid-19 a global pandemic, it has become evident that certain business units and organizational functions failed both their employees and their companies during this tumultuous period. A lack of strategic planning, inadequate technological infrastructure, and poor communication and leadership undermined many businesses' ability to transition smoothly.
This article will examine how key business areas like human resources, information technology, operations, and executive leadership let down their workforce and hurt their organizations' pandemic response and post-Covid recovery efforts. Real-world case studies will illustrate the critical shortcomings that must be addressed for companies to build greater resilience against future disruptions.
Human Resources' Biggest Failing: Being Unprepared
Of all the business units, the human resources (HR) department should have been the most proactive in dealing with the mass shift to remote work brought on by Covid-19. After all, managing the employee experience is the core responsibility of HR. Yet in many companies, HR was woefully unprepared and dropped the ball, leaving employees feeling unsupported and disengaged.
A 2020 survey by the Society for Human Resource Management found that only 35% of companies felt prepared to deal with the pandemic's impact on their workforce. A mere 19% had reviewed or updated relevant policies and procedures within the past six months before Covid hit.
With little strategic planning or updated guidelines in place, HR departments scrambled to figure out things like:
One of the clearest examples of HR failing both employees and the organization is in the area of employee communication and support for remote workers' wellbeing.
Case Study: Fujitsu's Poor Virtual Employee Support
Fujitsu is a Japanese multinational IT services company with over 130,000 employees globally. When the pandemic first began, Fujitsu mandated that 80% of its workplace-based employees work from home to reduce infection risk. However, it provided little guidance or resources to help employees adapt.
According to internal employee surveys obtained by Bloomberg News, over 80% of Fujitsu's workers in Japan felt the company's communications were inadequate. Employees reported feeling isolated, disconnected from leadership, and uncertain about performance expectations. Mental health issues spiked, with over 25% of employees showing signs of depression.
Rather than being proactive in establishing support systems, HR only reacted after employees were already suffering. An employee told Bloomberg, "Up until now, the company has been very inward-looking and followed a traditional working practice, but the pandemic has shown how backwards the company's personnel management strategy is."
Fujitsu's HR team later implemented some wellness initiatives like virtual counseling and resilience training. But by then, the damage was already done in the form of sinking employee productivity, engagement and retention issues. Fujitsu is far from alone - many companies experienced similar HR breakdowns during the crisis.
The key lesson is that HR departments must have comprehensive strategies, policies and resources in place to compassionately support employees through prolonged crises and disruptions like a pandemic. Mere reactionary responses are insufficient.
IT Systems & Security Let Employees Down
Another major failure occurred in the information technology (IT) realm, as IT infrastructures, systems, tools and cybersecurity practices did not keep pace with the explosive growth of remote work. Legacy setups broke down under the strain, hampering productivity and leaving networks exposed.
According to Microsoft, there was a 600% increase in cloud services usage due to remote work during Covid. Yet only 29% of corporate employees had worked remotely before the pandemic. It was a lopsided and rapid shift that overwhelmed IT capabilities at many organizations.
The Results? Productivity Loss and Security Risks
The IT breakdowns caused widespread inefficiencies and frustrated employees trying to work from home. Common problems included:
Beyond just productivity drains, the hasty shift to remote work opened up major new cybersecurity vulnerabilities that many companies failed to adequately address. According to IBM Security, remote work drove a 600% rise in cloud misconfigurations - a top cause of data breaches. Phishing attempts also skyrocketed 600%.
Case Study: Canon IT Systems Failure
The Japanese tech giant Canon offers a stark example of a major company whose outdated IT infrastructure completely crumbled under the remote work demands of Covid-19. Canon's many subsidiaries each had their own separate IT systems and VPN setups, with little integration or consistency.
When Covid hit and 90% of Canon employees switched to remote work, the decentralized VPN network quickly became overloaded and failed. Lacking bandwidth, many remote employees were unable to access internal systems, servers or videoconferencing. Productivity plummeted as staff idled for long periods waiting to connect.
"Half of employees waiting hours to use the VPN gives you an idea of how difficult the situation was," a Canon employee told Nikkei Asia. Canon's inadequate network architecture created chaos and lost work hours across the organization.
Not until March 2021 did Canon finish updating its outmoded IT infrastructure to handle the remote work demand. It was too little, too late for many frustrated employees who had spent the better part of a year grappling with connectivity issues.
The takeaway is clear - companies need to proactively modernize IT infrastructure, networking, security tools and protocols to handle our increasingly digital and remote work reality. Not doing so creates loss of productivity, risk, and disengagement.
Operations Failures During Transitions
Operations units like supply chain, manufacturing, logistics, and facilities management also dropped the ball in their pandemic planning and execution. Breakdowns occurred as companies tried to restart physical operations amidst constantly shifting rules and disrupted distribution networks.
Common operational pitfalls included:
All these missteps had rippling effects across the organization, as employees from the frontlines to corporate offices dealt with confusion, delays, product shortages and safety concerns. If operations leaders had stronger strategic foresight and execution, much of this chaos could have been mitigated.
领英推荐
Case Study: Tyson Foods' Covid Spread and Poor Response
One of the most egregious examples of operational mismanagement came from the food production giant Tyson Foods. Despite rising Covid cases in early 2020, Tyson showed a lack of urgency in implementing protective measures to prevent viral spread in its meat processing facilities.
According to a blistering Congressional report, Tyson was slow to acquire safety supplies and mandate basic protocols like temperature checks and physical distancing. The company prioritized profit over worker safety, crowding employees to maximize production and discouraging sick employees from taking leave.
The results were disastrous - at least 59,000 Tyson workers contracted Covid-19 and 151 died from the virus. Beyond the staggering human toll, Tyson's production suffered as outbreaks forced temporary plant closures and meat shortages roiled the food supply chain.
Tyson was accused of "a callous disregard for worker health" and providing inadequate workplace protections. It's a disturbing case study in how poor operational decisions around safety measures and crisis procedures can endanger employees and severely impact business continuity. With stronger prevention protocols, much harm could've been prevented.
Ethical and Strategic Leadership Voids
While many business units clearly failed during Covid due to lack of preparedness and execution, the ultimate accountability lies with top executive leadership and governance boards. Company leaders exhibited disappointing deficits in ethical decision-making, stakeholder focus and strategic crisis planning.
The early pandemic days were marked by layoffs, furloughs, wage cuts and bonus retractions - often while senior leaders maintained lavish pay packages. Worse, many fired workers were kicked off healthcare benefits in the midst of a health crisis. It was a stark display of misaligned priorities that eroded employee trust.
PwC's 2020 Workforce Pulse survey found that only 30% of employees trusted their company leadership to navigate the crisis successfully. Reasons cited were poor planning, insufficient communication, perceived unfair policies, and lack of demonstrated care for employees' wellbeing.
Leaders were too short-sighted and shareholder-focused in their pandemic response, failing to uphold stakeholder principles. The narrow prioritization of short-term profits over employees and longer-term resiliency did tremendous damage to organizational culture and morale.
Case Study: Delta's Controversial Pandemic Profiteering
A damning case study in unethical crisis leadership is Delta Air Lines' actions and the resulting $6.5 billion pandemic windfall it received from the U.S. government through the CARES Act bailout program for airlines.
While gratefully accepting billions in taxpayer aid, Delta imposed harsh measures like unpaid leave, reduced worker hours, and scaling back health benefits for employees already suffering during Covid-19. Simultaneously, Delta's top executives awarded themselves $107 million in bonuses and saw CEO Ed Bastian's compensation rise 30% to $13.2 million in 2020.
The disconnect between rewarding leadership while squeezing frontline staff during a crisis sparked outrage. Labor unions decried that a publicly-subsidized corporation would put "corporate profits ahead of workers and their families." It erased goodwill Delta had built.
More broadly, critics argued the CARES Act funds enabled "pandemic profiteering" that enriched shareholders and executives rather than protecting jobs and worker wellbeing as intended. Delta and others showed misguided priorities by preserving payouts to investors and corporate elite ahead of frontline employees bearing the true brunt of harm.
This visible ethical lapse illustrates how out-of-touch leadership thinking failed organizations and their workforce. Short-termism prevailed over sustainable, stakeholder-driven policies that could have built deeper reserves of worker goodwill and company resilience against future shocks.
The Path Forward - Lessons for Resilient Organizations
While the pandemic response in many enterprises was deeply flawed, the past few years surfaced invaluable lessons on what capabilities organizations need to cultivate greater resilience and responsiveness for future crises.
Systemic weaknesses were exposed across human resources, information technology, operations, and ethical leadership. To better withstand severe disruption, companies must shore up critical areas:
People & Culture: HR needs robust contingency policies, digital workforce enablement plans, robust health/safety protocols and streamlined communications. Prioritizing worker wellbeing through holistic programs and leading with stakeholder empathy is crucial.
Technology & Security: Companies require modernized, scalable IT architecture capable of supporting remote work demand surges and secure home setups. Thorough cybersecurity and backup plans are imperative as cyber threats intensify.
Business Continuity: Operations contingency planning must be vastly improved, with backup supply chain scenarios, crisis safety stocks, agile workflows, and extensive modeling of potential disruption impacts.
Ethical Governance: Executive leadership has to embrace true stakeholder capitalism over shareholder primacy. Moral courage to uphold integrity and fairness principles during crises is paramount for preserving employee/public trust.
Despite serious shortcomings revealed by Covid-19, the pandemic provided an invaluable wake-up call. By addressing vulnerabilities in human resources, technology infrastructure, operational resilience, and moral governance, organizations can emerge stronger and better prepared for the next "unthinkable" crisis event.
The virus was devastating, but its greatest business impact may be the powerful lessons learned about what capabilities leaders must prioritize today for a more crisis-proof future. Ensuring the workforce is genuinely supported, digitally enabled, and ethically led through disruptive storms can safeguard companies' longevity and minimize harm to employees, customers and society.
References:
Society for Human Resource Management (2020). Navigating COVID-19: Impact of the Pandemic on HR Jobs. https://www.shrm.org/about-shrm/Documents/SHRM%20Pandemic%20Report%20for%20Release.pdf
Hida, M., Kurtenbach, E. & Kageyama, Y. (2021, April 4). "Some Japanese Companies Have CEOs Earning 1,000 Times More Than Staff." Chicago Tribune. https://www.chicagotribune.com/business/ct-nw-japan-workers-pandemic-blues-20210404-7svqfmv4e5f5viwqmghilssz3i-story.html
Kavanagh, D. & Hall, A. (2020, March 30). "COVID-19 Has Permanently Changed Remote Work & Cybersecurity." IBM Security Intelligence. https://securityintelligence.com/posts/covid-19-remote-work-cybersecurity-impacts/
Yano, K. & Yonemura, M. (2021, June 7). "Canon's VPN crumbles as remote work stresses networks: Workers scramble to connect." Nikkei Asia. https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Technology/Canon-s-VPN-crumbles-as-remote-work-stresses-networks-Workers-scramble-to-connect
Congressional Coronavirus Crisis Committee (2022). Minority Staff Report - Unchecked: How Tyson Prioritized Profits Over Worker Safety in the COVID-19 Pandemic. https://coronavirus.house.gov/sites/democrats.coronavirus.house.gov/files/2022.6.29%20CCCC%20Tyson%20Report%20Final.pdf
PwC (2020). PwC's COVID-19 CFO Pulse Survey. https://www.pwc.com/us/en/library/covid-19/pwc-covid-19-cfo-pulse-survey.html
The Air Current (2020, March 28). "Delta Air Lines Awards Executives $107 Million in Four Days After Tapping $3 Billion in CARES Act Relief." https://theaircurrent.com/delta-air-lines/delta-air-lines-awards-executives-107-million-in-four-days-after-tapping-cares-act-relief/