As states begin to enter different phases of their reopening plans, more people are returning to their offices and allowing some employees to come back and work. The transitional period is going to be challenging, and business leaders will need to pay close attention to their state and federal guidelines as they consider how to move forward. The plan will vary between industries, and while there is no road map to a successful reopening that is one-size-fits-all, we hope to give you some guidance and things to keep in mind. 

Implementing the Return to Work Program

The Trump Administration has released a guide to Opening Up America Again, which can answer many of the business-specific questions you might have. Part of the program outlines phases of opening and the requirements for each phase. States have their own versions of these plans, and the state plans are what businesses must abide by, so it is essential to know your state’s specific reopening plan.

One thing to keep in mind is that even if the state says you can reopen, you do not have to reopen. Business owners have the choice of whether to reopen or not and can abide by guidelines listed in phases of the reopening plan even after the state has moved into another plan. The best place to get information on your state-specific plans is the US Chamber of Commerce.

Before you can implement your return to work plan; however, you need to ensure you have a plan to implement. Creating a plan for reopening your business includes reviewing and revising your policies for:

• Hiring/rehiring/recalling employees
• Policies and guidelines on leave, benefits, PTO, and FMLA
• Attendance policies
• Guidelines and policies on cleaning, disinfecting
• Personal protective equipment
• Commercial cleaning schedules
• Work from home guidelines
• Social distancing guidelines

If you need help preparing your back to work plan, check out the return to work toolkit we assembled to help frame your thinking to develop the best plan for your business.

Supporting Public Health

Another component to opening your business responsibly is supporting public health efforts in stopping the spread of COVID-19, commonly called coronavirus. Make sure to have handwashing and sanitization stations easily accessible to employees and customers or clients that come into the office. You should also provide personal protective equipment to your employees, such as reusable masks and gloves. Disposable masks and gloves can be offered to clients and customers who enter your business.

Supporting Your Employees

We are in unprecedented times, and just as business owners are struggling, the employees are as well. Some of your employees may not have ever been able to collect unemployment because of how backed up many states are/were in processing claims. You may have employees who had contracted COVID-19 themselves or had family and loved ones who did. There may be employees who continue to care for high-risk and sick relatives, and there is no doubt that the pandemic has been challenging mentally and emotionally as well.

If you can, provide your employees with reasonable accommodations such as allowing them to work part-time from or remain working from home. Have a plan for your vulnerable employees who may not be comfortable or feel safe coming back to work yet. Take care to reread and understand the Americans with Disabilities Act before chatting with your employees about their medical and health issues or disabilities.

States are preparing to open back up, and others already have, which means that before you know it, the world will be getting back to normal, and you’ll be going back to work. After several weeks off, transitioning back into normal life will be challenging; however, there are many things workers and business owners can do to prepare.

How Business Owners Can Prepare for Worker Return

Business owners have a particularly hard task in preparing to open their businesses back up. There are many considerations you need to make before opening the doors and inviting employees back to work. What’s most important is that you follow all state and local guidelines where your business is located.

You’ll also need to:

• Provide Personal Protective Equipment – You’ll want to ensure that you are keeping your employees and clients or customers safe by following all guidelines for personal protective equipment, PPE. Ensure there are adequate masks, hand sanitizer, disinfectant and other PPE available. Make sure to keep the delivery windows in mind to ensure you are ordering PPE with enough time to have it on hand before opening your business.
• Stock Up and Be Prepared – The shutdown happened quickly, and you may have halted your shipments and stopped stocking your shelves abruptly. You’ll need to make sure your business is ready to open by ensuring your products are in stock, and your customers and clients can get what they need. The last thing you want is your customers being excited to shop and work with you and having nothing to offer.
• Be Prepared for a Thorough Cleaning – Dust settles rapidly, and if your offices or business has been empty for weeks, you should consider a deep cleaning before letting employees come back to work. There are professional services available for commercial cleaning, but you can also bring staff in provided you have the right PPE for them to wear and commercial grade cleaning products. A carpet cleaning or floor strip and wax may be necessary for some businesses, and these types of services require the use of specialized cleaning equipment.
• Check the Plumbing – Stagnant plumbing systems could be harboring deadly bacteria such as Legionnaires’ disease. According to a NYTimes article, Facilities staff can also flush out old water and bring in a new and fresh supply. Or they can send a high dose of disinfectant through the building and raise temperatures to kill the microbes.
• Have Patience and Compassion – Some of your employees might have been or be ill, have family members that are ill, or be having trouble adjusting to the transition back to work themselves. Give your employees a few days or weeks to get back into the swing of things if they seem to be struggling or have dealt with the illness.
• Be Available – Depending on the type of business you own, clients and customers who have been scarce for weeks might all be clamoring to contact your business now that it’s open. Don’t let yourself be in a position where consumer needs cannot be met, or you are struggling to keep up with the workflow. Ask your employees to be flexible with their schedules and availability, if possible. Some of your employees may have found jobs as essential workers during the pandemic, so you’ll also need to check your staffing levels and adjust as needed.

How Employees Can Prepare to Return to Work

As a worker, you may have been at home for weeks due to stay-at-home orders or job shutdowns. You  have found lots of ways to stay busy from yard work and gardening to home renovation projects you never got around to. You might have written a book, picked your guitar back up, or started cooking classes, so when it’s time to get back to reality and go to work, the transition can be just as tricky on individual employees as it is on business owners.

Here are a few things you as an employee can do to prepare to go back to work:

• Communicate – If you haven’t talked to your employer in some time, make sure to check-in and communicate any scheduling needs or conflicts you may have in going back to work. Communication is especially if those needs conflict with the usual schedule you previously had. You should also let your employer know if you are available and willing to be flexible as business needs change, including staying over your shift or picking up extra hours as needed.
• Be Healthy – As states reopen, there will be different mandates in place on wearing personal protective equipment, and employees should take caution to follow all regulations in place. All employees need to continue to wash their hands, use hand sanitizer, and any recommended PPE. If you are feeling ill or showing symptoms of being sick, you should contact your employer right away.
• Finish Up Existing Home Projects, If At All Possible – Don’t let home projects started during quarantine distract you while being back at work. If your employer gives you a return to work date in advance, ensure you finish up the things you started at home so you can have a clear head when you return to work.
• Be Patient and Positive – Do your best to keep a positive outlook and keep in mind that the clients and customers might have different attitudes than they did before the COVID-19 crisis. Be patient as the world returns to normalcy, and your clients and customers go back to their usual routines. Some businesses might be slow at first, while others may be swamped the first few weeks of being back open as consumers can go out and shop again. Clients who have had their businesses stalled may be in the market to get started right away with new services and equipment. No matter how reopening affects business, you must ensure you are prepared and ready for anything.

The world is slowly going to return to the new normal, and getting back to your old life might be complicated; however, following our tips can pull you through the transition. Whether you own a business or are an employee going back to work for the first time in weeks, the most important thing you can do is jump back in with confidence, excitement and safely.

Some sectors thrive amidst a rapidly fluctuating economy

Last Friday, President Trump signed into law an economic stimulus package valued at $2 trillion, a number that is more than twice the size of that which was made available after the financial crisis of 2008. The funds are targeted at measures to alleviate the financial shock that has arisen as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, and they couldn’t not come a moment too soon. The package is a bright spot in an otherwise clouded sky, and not just for the sick, or the font-line medical professionals who are bearing the brunt of it all.

For American businesses from tech to manufacturing, the package represents a potential foothold atop the frightening slope that our economy has been on.

The Rundown: What’s in the CARES Act Stimulus Package

The unanimously passed bill is the most recent installment in the single largest financial stimulus action ever taken by the American government. The multi-pronged funding measure is not only set to send American adults direct cash payments to help with the basic necessities, but it also includes a slew of other emergency provisions for hospitals, unemployment programs, and small businesses that are unable to cover their basic monthly payments amidst a near nationwide lockdown.

The Important CARES Act Tax Provisions Every Equipment or Technology Company Should Know About

While there has been a lot of discussion about how effectively the CARES Act will be able to help out small business and transportation industries, there has been significantly less talk about what it is going to do for tech companies and medium to large size manufacturers, to not-so-small business sectors that aren’t likely to get the same kind of bailouts as healthcare or transportation.

Fortunately, all three phases of the overall stimulus package include important tax provisions that might be able to help such companies recover. One such provision is a 50% employee retention payroll tax credit that can be applied to any wages paid to workers during the COVID-19 outbreak. This is going to be particularly important for factories, assembly operations, and software firms who were forced to either furlough their staff as a result of plummeting receipts, or operate at reduced employment due to enforced quarantine measures.

Another important provision is that employers be able to hold of on paying their 2020 payroll taxes until 2021 or 2022, opening up an estimated $300 billion of additional operating cash for business nationwide. When paired with the fully refundable tax credit, the overall benefit is looking like something that is going to stimulate a potentially rapid return to normalcy for many operations.

The Connected Commerce Council, a non-profit trade organization, has been keeping a comprehensive list of other emergency funding options. It’s a valuable tool in finding resources available to small businesses that are impacted by COVID-19.

Manufacturers Get Big Help from the Economic Development Administration

Of the $3 trillion being a distributed, just over $3 billion of that has been earmarked to support economic development and help revitalize local and state communities by rebuilding industries that have been affected. Specifically, this money will be given to the Economic Development Administration (EDA), which will be able to provide a significantly higher amount of financial assistance to impacted industries like tourism and manufacturing chains.

The Tech & Software Boom No One Saw Coming

While lawmakers squabbled over the detailed of the recovery act, the free market economy adjusted in its own surprising ways.

Even the initial talk of social distance and potential quarantines has some employers and employees alike thinking about what it would take to adapt. Video conferencing software such as Skype, Zoom, and dozens of others were one of the first sectors to experience the boom. It didn’t take long for investors and VCs to key into what was going on.

When the virtual classroom app Zoom experienced an astounding 2.13 million downloads in the UK on March 23^rd (the day that the UK lockdown was announced) shares began to soar. According to a report from The Guardian, Zoom chief executive Eric Yuan saw his net worth jump from $4 billion to $7.9 billion, making him one of the richest people on the planet.

Remote conferencing isn’t the only tech space that has seen rapid, sometimes hard-to-manage spikes in consumer demand. News reports about widespread toilet paper hoarding is no doubt the driver behind skyrocketing bidet sales, and state-sponsored “stay at home” measures and lockdowns have made some online games more popular than they have ever been.

Why Software Companies, Big Tech, & IT Are Likely to Come Out Even Stronger

Without question, it is too early to know how it is going to shake out for a lot of companies, but there are some indications that the stimulus package, when combined with the unprecedented changes we have seen in the global workforce, might emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic with an even stronger financial outlook.

The concept of an economic “snapback” was perhaps less relevant with the 2008 crisis, but it is looking more and more like the forecast for the later half of 2020. The federal stimulus package is making it far more likely that businesses and individuals alike will be able to keep themselves afloat as the virus runs its course.

On the other side of it all is the snapback that manufacturers and light industry companies will be able to benefit from the most. Things like cars, tractors, and construction equipment that was not purchased in Q1 and Q2 are likely going to be purchased just the same in Q3, hopefully providing the defibrillation required to get national supply chains back up and running.

“This is Not the End”: Congress Preps for Phase IV

In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, the Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer made it clear that more help is on the way: “This is certainly not the end of our work here in Congress – rather the end of the beginning.”

While it is too early to speculate on what specific industries might be included in the next phase of the stimulus package or how much it would be valued at, we can say this: it certainly isn’t going to hurt.

Increasingly, owners & employees seem to think so.

As the world reels from the advance of COVID-19, a sudden and perhaps expected drop in economic confidence has spread through a number of American industries, and the numbers behind it all are finally starting to come in. Businesses are closing, employees are being laid off in droves, and people on both sides of the equation are wondering what the next few months have in store.

With new state-sponsored quarantine measures being introduces every day, small businesses are finally beginning to see the hard hit that many of us had been predicting. According to a new Goldman Sachs poll, the number of American businesses that are feeling impacted by COVID-19 is at a staggering 97%. The same poll suggested that under the current trends, more than 50% of small businesses in the United States believe they will be able to keep their businesses open for another three months.

Some of these businesses have attempted to switched to remote operations, while other service-based businesses who don’t have that option have been forced to either press on, potentially exposing their employees and customers to infection, or shutting their doors in hopes of surviving off of savings.

For many others, statewide lockdowns have made the decision for them.

The Service Industry Is Shuttering

Across the country, one of the most drastic and immediate effects of the COVID-19 economic slowdown can be seen in the restaurant and service industry. This includes breweries.

In places like Washington, California, Michigan, Ohio, Illinois, and Michigan, state-mandated shutdowns have closed the doors on everything from restaurants and bars to casinos and music venues. Other states do not seem far behind, and by the time you read this the likelihood is that the list will have increased.

In cities like New York and Los Angeles, two of the largest cities in the country, these shutdowns represent an immediate halt of one of the largest and most lucrative industries around (around $51 billion in NYC alone, according to the National Restaurant Association).

While many restaurants have managed to stay open with take-out and delivery options (to varying degrees of success) many others have been forced to shut down entirely, leaving their employees without an income.

The Complex Transition to Work-From-Home

While businesses like restaurants, clubs, and sports centers simply do not have the option, some small businesses are attempting the transition to remote positions that can allow their employees to work from home. While bigger businesses have been experimenting with this shift for a few years now, it remains largely uncharted for smaller businesses whose positions are centered around any type of customer interaction.

Either way, the remote working trend is not likely to be thwarted even by the eventual retreat of COVID 19. Already, researchers are predicting a permanent shift in American working patterns as many employees will not think very highly of returning to the office after the shutdowns are over.

Still, the discussion of remote employment, although relevant, does little to improve the position of small business owners, whose financial confidence seems to be dropping by the day.

A Shared Lack of Optimism

The financial market, in the meantime, has been experiencing its own difficulties as a result of this dropping confidence.

According to a manufacturing survey from the New York Federal Reserve showed business conditions had dropped to their lowest levels since 2009. The report also clearly demonstrated that delivery times and inventories have both gone up significantly in a very short period of time.

The basic thrust of the report:

Economic optimism is at its lowest level since 2009, and manufacturing, whether we like it or not, has likely returned to recession. Of course, this report was based on a survey conducted in early March; things have certainly gotten worse since then.

The Options on the Table

While Washington scrambles to come up with a solution with an adequate scope, some federal and state agencies have stepped forward to offer small businesses the help they need to survive the lockdown.

For one, the Small Business Administration has beefed up the value of their funding pool by an additional $30 billion in order to help businesses that have been hit hard by the virus. Low-interest disaster loans are capable of covering debt payments and payroll, which might just be enough to keep some doors open.

On the other hand, SBA loans are restricted to federally-designated disaster areas, meaning that many business owners are not going to be eligible on what feels to many affected business owners like an unfair technicality considering the circumstances.

City Governments Stepping In

With the federal relief yet to arrive and the details yet to be revealed, many city governments and municipalities are stepping forward to protect their local economies from potential collapse. The city of Denver, for instance, has made available a $7,500 grant for small business that are likely going to have to close their doors, if they haven’t already. And while $7,500 is certainly better than the alternative, for many businesses is a small drop in the bucket of what kind of funds would be needed to survive a potential long-term shutdown.

The Senate Approves $350 Billion in Small Business Loans

As this is being written, the Unites States Senate has approved a stimulus package that is designed to alleviate financial woes that have accrued as a result of the shutdown, both for individual citizens and for small businesses. Under the package agreement, the federal government would direct $350 billion to the Small Business Administration, bolstering a loan program that has already seen a sharp increase in applications.

While there is no question that the beefed up loan program would be welcomed by many, there is some uncertainty in whether or not it will be enough to keep the most vulnerable businesses from shuttering for good. Because SBA loans can only be used for payroll and debt operations, there is worry from small operators about how the lack of actual revenue will affect their decision making in the short term.

The legislation, valued at a total of $2 trillion, heads to the House on Friday, March 27, 2020, where it is expected to pass with strong bipartisan support.

With the world in the grips of coronavirus panic and the World Health Organization (WHO) officially labeling it a pandemic on March 11, 2020, how will it affect you and your loved ones personally?  And how will it affect your business?

A pandemic, according to the WHO is “… the worldwide spread of a new disease.” The coronavirus is in over 114 countries including the US.

Since the outbreak of coronavirus, the US stock market has lost more than three trillion dollars and many people have gone into full-on panic mode, buying excessive amounts of supplies in preparation of a more widespread outbreak, as “doomsday preppers” crawl out of the woodwork.   

Both large and small businesses must be proactive in planning on how to address the inevitable disruptions that the virus’s impact will have on the supply chain, as well as labor shortages that will likely result as it continues to spread. 

This guide has been put together to help you take the necessary steps today to ensure that you’re properly prepared.