The COVID-19 pandemic and its impacts, both on public health and the global economy, are creating challenging times for all of us.
The first and immediate concern of Enablon was to ensure the health and wellbeing of its employees, which is why we all work from home and there are dedicated communication channels about COVID-19 to assist us.
But we also have a community of clients to think about. When we consider the number of users on Enablon and the number of employees at firms using Enablon, we’re talking about millions of people, men and women who have families and who are part of local communities. It is therefore imperative that we help our clients navigate through these challenging times.
On March 19, we hosted a webinar where three Enablon clients shared with our community the steps that they’re taking with our solutions to respond to the COVID-19 crisis. In keeping with our goal of sharing the collective knowledge of the Enablon community with everyone, this post explains some of the best practices of our three clients.
Our hope is that you will learn something new about what you can do in your own organization, to help your employees, their families, and local communities.
Ensuring compliance with protective measures
The first case study is from Worldwide Flight Services (WFS), a leading ground handling organization with 27,000 employees, that provides high quality cargo, passenger, premium, ramp, baggage and technical services across 200 airports around the world.
WFS explained during the webinar that they verify global compliance with hygiene measures and business continuity planning through Enablon.
Every week, WFS launches inspections, conducted through the Enablon Go mobile app, to check a number of things, including:
- Have “Basic Hygiene Measures” posters been posted in all work areas, rooms and offices?
- Is hand sanitizer available and supplied in all work areas?
- Is there soap and water available in all rest rooms for proper hand washing?
- Have applicable management delegation of duties been identified and communicated in the event of absences of staff that perform critical tasks?
The data is then analyzed to identify trends and problem areas. Compliance is measured and an evaluation is made whether controls are deployed effectively. In addition, actions are identified, and reports are sent to coordinate and manage local follow-up actions.
Real-time monitoring of COVID-19 cases
During the webinar, a leading research-based biopharmaceutical company, with more than 90,000 employees around the world, explained how they are using Enablon to keep track of key metrics related to COVID-19 preparedness at each site, such as:
- Employee health status. Metrics include confirmed cases, suspected cases, absenteeism due to the virus, etc.
- Status of site operations, including the status of the crisis management team and the preparedness plan.
- Status of controls, including the communication of guidance (hand washing, staying home when ill, etc.), facility cleaning procedures, current stock of a site’s cleaning suppliers/PPE, etc.
- Impacts, including actual and potential impacts on inventories, supply chains, etc.
Data from all sites is then rolled up to a global corporate summary dashboard. Impacts are evaluated at the enterprise level, and specific risk areas or at-risk facilities are identified.
Detecting cases early at an industry-leading technology company
The third case study shared during our webinar was about an industry-leading multinational technology company with more than 130,000 employees across the globe.
The company uses the Enablon platform to enter and report COVID-19 cases identified at any of its hundreds of retail stores and offices, in order to do early detection. As soon as there are any reported cases, locations are either closed down entirely or remedial measures are implemented.
By using real-time data and detecting cases early, the company is able to take a proactive approach to COVID-19 response.
As a service to our community, we’re making available new features, templates and configuration packages based on these best practices and guidelines from organizations such as the World Health Organization (WHO), the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), immediately and free of charge.
If you’re a member of the Enablon community, we hope that you will leverage these new tools to strengthen your COVID-19 response. And if you’re not yet a member of our community, we hope that the three cases highlighted in this post give you good ideas to improve your COVID-19 response.
Finally, I want to end on a personal note with four simple words. I always tell myself these four words whenever I’m faced with any challenge, and COVID-19 is not an exception: This Too Shall Pass. I hope these words give you comfort as well.
