A Changing Workplace and the Role of Technology

Shocking change hit the workplace in March and April and will have long-term ramifications.  No one should think that once the pandemic passes the workplace will go back to the way it was.  Too much has changed for that.  So, let’s be thinking about what is working and what is not. 

The healthcare industry has laid off or furloughed workers and sent many non-patient care staff home to work remotely.  Nearly half of the jobs in the United States-70 million-have been directly affected by COVID-19, according to the rating agency Moody’s Analytics.  “There are 33 million jobs at high risk of job loss, lost hours or pay cuts, and another 37 million at medium risk,” says Mark Zandi chief economist at Moddy’s.  Entire industries are shattered by shutdowns. 

Even for those with job security, there have been critical shifts in the way business is conducted.  If you didn’t know how to teleconference, share digital documents and keep a computer functional on your own, you had better learn sooner rather than later.  While it will likely take months if not years to digest all of the work-related changes, there’s no doubt that companies are doing things in radically different ways and many will embrace lessons learned instead of returning to the status quo.

Working from home has been discouraged, or moderately embraced, for decades.  Remote workers have always been regarded as second-rate to those counterparts that wield corporate building offices with a window.  I don’t think there will ever be a company again that doesn’t consider that some element of emergency preparedness has to be made and working remotely in some form needs to be addressed and hopefully turned into a formalized policy.   

Some Healthcare Supply Chain people are knowledge workers, meaning that they work with data, ideas and information rather than machinery.  Offering work-place flexibility through remote work is one way that employers can retain and attract skilled workers in the future.  So how successful has your transition been to “work-from-home”; or was your organization unable to offer this option due primarily to the lack of secure or advanced technology, thus putting non-essential workers at risk?  Are you able to access your ERP/MMIS or other critical data bases remotely?  How did you shift to virtual meetings and how long did it take you to become comfortable taking the tape off your video computer camera?  How do you effectively transfer files or route documents for edits and approval signatures?  Are you able to pull contracts from an electronic data base or more importantly work a project from start to finish, including discussions with unlimited subject matter experts; all online?  Are critical decisions such as substitute products able to be documented and communicated remotely to a large group? 

All of these basic functions have been a challenge, but all are doable remotely.  If you have not thought strategically about moving to a virtual or remote workflow process application, you need to start.  How will your organization’s commitment to virtual or remote access change in the coming months?  We should not have to be physically in the healthcare building to make and exercise decision making.  Our world is connected 24/7, sadly our hospital operational systems may not be.