In March of 2020, many companies were left with no option but to shut down their physical offices and send their employees to work from home. A Gartner survey conducted at that time showed that 88% of companies encouraged or required their employees to work from home as the pandemic spread. Over those first couple of weeks, as people transitioned to remote work, home offices were set up wherever possible, including in closets, video conferences took the place of in-person meetings, and corporate technology took center stage with IT departments setting up virtual private networks (VPNs) if employees didn’t have work laptops to take home. Now, as offices re-open or are thinking about re-opening soon, upper management and office managers alike need to discuss how that will work; if employees will come back to the office full-time; and safety protocols.
Planning for your office to re-open post- pandemic
