Office Alternatives in Post-Covid Workplace

by Reggie Moore Professional writer and proto entrepreneur

The recent pandemic has brought unprecedented changes in various industries. Some of these changes are set to remain long after the pandemic. The pandemic saw millions of people rendered jobless, with many more having to work on reduced salaries. However, this was also a great opportunity for companies to restructure their operations to protect themselves and their employees against future crises. The Post-COVID era is set to usher in new protocols featuring extreme business continuity that was previously unheard of.

This article focuses on some of the trends set to dominate workplaces in the coming months after returning to normalcy.

Zero-touch Office Environments

Employers are tasked with redesigning the workplace to reduce physical contact with surfaces. This can be done by installing modern equipment such as sensor-based doors, elevators, or light switches that fully function without necessarily having to touch. This move will largely leverage the use of other techniques such as voice or movement activation technologies. To protect the staff, the employers need to be proactive, implementing previous not in play. Currently, people are advised against touching doors, elevators, or buttons. For this reason, voice-controlled lifts, office equipment, and facial recognition software need to be installed in strategic locations throughout the office. This way, they can effectively minimize contact through surfaces.

Thermal Imaging

All over the globe, people have been calling out for an opportunity to resume their workstations. However, to identify potential victims of the virus, companies need to invest in thermal imaging solutions. This technology is currently in play and has been adjusted to serve as a fever-screening solution. This way, it can detect fever in employees and visitors on arrival, thus preventing potential victims from accessing the office buildings. Various medical technology firms have reported increased demand for their products, specifically the infrared cameras and thermal guns used to detect even the slightest changes in body temperatures.

Shared Workspaces

Where so many businesses have successfully transferred their workforces to a work-from-home situation, many have found it easier to keep their employees at home for several reasons. First, it saves a ludicrous amount of money over paying for commercial property. Second, it also helps keep the transmission of office sicknesses down, which was a problem every flu season before COVID and likely after as well. Sometimes you still need a place to meet and conduct business in person, and instead of leasing a huge office building, there are other options out there. For times when in-person meetings can’t be avoided, using a shared workspace might. Basically, these workspaces (like this coworking space in Melbourne) are commercial buildings that lease out small blocks of the workspace as small as a single desk and as large as a conference room. This can be the perfect middle-ground solution to keeping the majority of your workforce at home while still having a space to meet in person for important meetings with clients, employees, or for daily work for those employees who prefer to leave home to do work.

Connected HVAC

The traditionally use heat, ventilation, and air conditioning system has been proven to increase the chances of spreading the virus within the office. This is because of the high-speed airflow from one individual to another. In the coming weeks of resuming work, employers are advised to leverage smart building technology to effectively control their HVAC system to help minimize the risk of spreading the virus. This technology is designed to help with thermal sterilization, irradiation, filtration, and air purification to ensure clean and safe air. The HVAC system can also be connected to ozone generators, ionic purifiers, and other devices designed to provide clean air within the workplace.

Collaboration Tools

During the pandemic peak, people working from home were forced to adopt new ways to collaborate with their colleagues through unified communication channels. However, even with the return to work in progress, some of the tools used in this phase will still play. This mainly because of the need to maintain social distancing. The collaboration tools will be used to replace going into offices or conference rooms for meetings. In line with this move, various companies have adopted video conferencing tools as an alternative to conducting physical meetings.

Every employer needs to borrow a lesson from the recent pandemic to keep your company and employees safe. These new alternatives are a great way of improving efficiency at the workplace while mitigating the spread of the virus.