How "Corona" is changing the way we work

Working concepts and processes that many people have gotten used to in their daily work are going through change. Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, working in split teams, from home or elsewhere has become run-of-the-mill for many – this is how the coronavirus is changing the working world. Companies were strongly engaged in developing and deploying protection measures to ensure the employees’ safety and maintain operational processes with a long-term influence on our future way of working. The coronavirus has taught us that one is impossible without the other: employers and employees alike have to deal and familiarize themselves with a new working reality.  

Many companies thought home office would be a temporary solution to stop the spread of the coronavirus. And although many employees were happy to be able to resume work and social contacts with colleagues after the lockdown, the desire to continue working from home still persists. However, some companies experience difficulties in implementing the required regulations on a permanent basis supporting alternative working concepts that, during the lockdown period, have proven to be good and effective.

It is generally expected that the desire for more flexible working time models will continue even after the pandemic; in other words, more flexibility in our daily work concepts will become the new standard in many companies. Bearing this in mind, appropriate solutions facilitating user-friendly planning, management and recording of working times in flexible teams are a must to manage volatile resource requirements in the best possible way.

The corona crisis further accelerates the digital transformation, recording of mobile working times and activities pushing “New Work” as a trend towards a flexible work organisation. The recent ECJ judgement on daily working time’s measurement involves further actions in most of the European countries regarding the implementation of T&A recording systems. Due to COVID-19, companies have to focus not only on “what”, but also on “how” to proceed. Given the trend for an increased number of coronavirus cases, companies without efficient decentralized organisational structures in place must ask themselves how they can ensure their future business operations without putting their workforce at risk. No doubt, future-proof models for working time organisation need to comply with valid statutory and collectively agreed regulations.

Quite often companies are technically not able to face the challenges in implementing the necessary conditions for a distributed working environment in a future-proof manner. This is frequently due to an outdated time management system still being in use. The ISGUS solution “ZEUS® Workforce Management” goes far beyond the scope of a conventional time and attendance system. Our web-based solution automates processes and even entire process chains thus relieving the HR departments of time-consuming routine tasks and queries. The new working world is completely different from the old one: static processes are replaced by dynamic ones that require much more flexibility and adaptability than ever before. One day, the coronavirus will pass – however, the innovative concepts and system solutions developed and put into place to overcome the COVID-19 crisis will be preserved for the future.