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The decisions across the globe to carefully loosen lockdowns in each country is progressing and it’s almost possible to hear the collective sigh from parents being relieved of home tutoring responsibility as schools steadily open in most places. I wonder whether homeschooling has been the most stressful impact of the crisis – for those of you impacted, it would be good to hear how you survived and what you learned by the experience.
Just as schools are preparing for return, so are we in terms of opening our offices in line with the framework of up to one day per week during June and potentially up to two days from July. This update, therefore, focuses on the progress we are making:
Return to work for remote workers
With the Le Mans office already open on the agreed basis of up to one day per week, we are looking to officially open the Head Office from next week. Preparations are being made to open the US office to remote workers through with movement restrictions remaining in force in New Jersey, this opening is unlikely to start until at least the end of June. Other smaller offices around the group have also allowed people into the office on a restricted and controlled basis.
The Head Office Health & Safety Team (Alison Wabe, Jennifer O’Brien and Pierre Sanchez) along with Ajita Chamberlin and Harsa Beagley (with guidance from Richard Llewellyn) have been busy discussing, drafting and actioning the many safety processes and protocols we will need to ensure we have a COVID-19 ready workspace. To support these protocols, the team have created a COVID-19 Safety Manual and it is available for you to view HERE.
In preparation for office openings, we have conducted local surveys to explore views on remote working in more detail. The initial results of the Head Office survey indicate that over 90% of people want to continue working remotely to a certain extent with 75% wanting to work at least 3 days from home. This result is aligned with the insights we have seen in the French survey results with the majority preferring 2-3 days of remote working. The full results of each survey will be communicated locally. The findings of the Head Office Future Scope project (which is looking at the model of work from a wider perspective) will, however, be communicated fully in a subsequent group update.
Holiday season approaches
Whilst countries around the world are in slightly different phases with respect to loosening up rules for COVID-19, what is clear is the consensus that overseas travel should be restricted unless essential. When it comes to business travel, our company direction continues to be that travel overseas or indeed any air travel is not authorised until official advice confirms that such travel is acceptable.
With respect to personal travel for holidays/vacations, our recommendation is that you follow the advice to not travel beyond your country’s border. This advice appears to be consistent for most countries. This is particularly important as there is still a risk that some countries may introduce restrictions without notice leaving you potentially stranded. Furthermore, quarantine is likely to be applicable at least in the short term and this would need to be factored into the number of days booked as holiday/vacation.
We do however recognise that some of you may have pre-existing bookings (made prior to end March) for later in the year that have not yet been cancelled by the travel companies. Our request is that you please advise your line manager if you have any overseas holiday booked and we will monitor the situation together should governments around the world relax their overseas travel advice. We do understand that the context is still uncertain so if you have any questions or concerns on this matter please talk to your line manager or your local HR contact.
Engagement is the focus
During this week the Brand teams have been presenting the 2021 brand plans to the local market teams in preparation for building next year’s local brand plans and budget. With the clear focus on driving consumer engagement over the last few months, the overarching approach is to focus on building full omni-channel communication and activation campaigns, vs prior years where we have tended to focus more on NPD.
The emphasis of all the plans for W&N, Liquitex, LB and Snazaroo is very much on communicating and building the emotional connection between our beautiful brands and their consumers.
Once the plans have been finalised, we will organise some general brand webinars so that everyone can hear about and appreciate the exciting plans.
Talking about webinars, it is good to know that some have been planned to take place in France to discuss the subjects of survey results, remote working and business performance. Carole Briquet will be facilitating the webinars and people have been invited to attend as appropriate to listen to their functional lead (whether Dominque Murzeau, Bruno Le Bourdais, Thierry Collot or Patrick Ollier) discuss their thinking. We will update you on how they went in the next update and please be assured that plans are in place to organise further webinars on the subjects you have already expressed interest in.
The final word as always is that we cannot stress enough the importance of following the safety protocols for everyone in Colart and your families: As a reminder please visit this site for further information on how to ensure protection against infection.
STAY SAFE, and if you have any questions on this update or any other subject you have a number of routes to take:
1. Your line manager
2. Your local HRBP
3. The Q&A platform on the intranet
Regards,
Jane Beeston
Chief People Officer.