Despite early fears that the coronavirus shutdown would derail his marketing company, one of our clients is learning that remote working is not only attainable, but it is also a strong model that allowed his company to permanently identify and cut unnecessary overhead.

 

“I was worried about this particular client during the first few weeks of the shutdown,” said Petra Heffron, an HR Advisor for Symmetry HRO. “But the situation was not as drastic as the CEO thought. He realized he was carrying facility expenses that were completely useless, and by eliminating these expenses, he could survive.”

 

Petra noted that the company’s workforce is tech-savvy and already accustomed to using technology to communicate. As a result, the CEO plans on keeping his workforce remote, even after the pandemic restrictions have been lifted.

 

“A lot of companies can make this model work. They just need to trust the people who work for them,” said Petra.

 

In his book, The 5 A’s of Great Employees, Eric Swenson wrote about the importance of agility, which he identified as the second trait of great employees. It is also a trait of great companies. Change has always been a constant. Companies that are unable or unwilling to adapt to change will become obsolete, but companies that are agile enough to adapt to change can rethink their models as the landscape changes.

 

This was true before the global pandemic, and it is even more apparent today. When a company is able to respond to the changes in the landscape, the company is more likely to survive than one that insists on hanging onto infrastructure, models, or even employees that no longer represent today’s needs.

 

Of course, agility doesn’t look the same for every company. A manufacturing company with a factory and a warehouse, for instance, cannot reasonably expect its factory workers to work remotely.

 

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