The Great Reconfiguration
In our continuing series of posts on COVID19’s impact on the economy and our path to recovery, this week we explore How we can safely steer the economy out of lockdown.
In his speech on the 30 April, UK prime minister Boris Johnson said that a "comprehensive" plan would be unveiled in week commencing 4 May describing how the government will restart the economy.
From the people we’re speaking to, the consensus is that the economy will be allowed to open up slightly from June with social distancing rules still applying but that following this there will be a period of 12-18 months when we will be in varying states of lockdown until a vaccine is found or infection rates drop to acceptably low levels.
We don’t think Johnson’s “comprehensive” plan will be definitive and we therefore think there are three good reasons that businesses start planning your restart now:
The UK government is being guided by ‘five tests’, which evaluate how much the virus is spreading. We understand there could be as little as 2-3 weeks’ notice given to businesses, so it makes sense to become familiar with the sorts of measures that government will be likely to take.
Local authorities are being proactive in their support of businesses, as we wrote about in our previous blog post. Councils will likely be tasked with communicating, supporting and enforcing new measures, so establishing relationships with your local council business support team makes more sense than ever.
Central government has shown a willingness to listen to feedback and adapt policies accordingly. If you have ideas about how you can safely restart your sector with social distancing your thinking could help influence their decisions.
While personal protective equipment (PPE) will become more available and the UK’s capacity to test and trace contacts of those infected will increase, we think social distancing measures will remain at the centre of any level of lockdown for the foreseeable future. This is because no PPE is going to be entirely reliable and its wearing is not practical in many everyday situations.
How do you plan for a safe restart?
We think this comes down to the following five questions:
How do you reconfigure your business so that you guarantee that customers, employees and suppliers are safe?
How can you design your business so that you are able to implement and relax procedures as and when required?
How do you maintain and grow new areas of business while restarting core businesses?
What do you do if you think that your business won’t be viable with social distancing measures in place?
How can you work with the government on the restart of your business?
Let’s look at each of these questions in more detail.
1. How do you reconfigure your business so that you can guarantee that customers, employees and suppliers will be safe?
We think this is central, hence why we’ve called this post ‘The Great Reconfiguration’.
There are three constraints that previously didn’t exist:
Employees and suppliers need to operate the company and supply chain safely.
All interfaces between your operational team and customers must be secure.
Customers need to remain a safe distance from one another.
Supermarkets and strategically important manufacturers like BAE Systems have been operating like this for five weeks so other industries can learn from what they’re doing. For example:
They are ‘passporting’ goods and people into buildings - for instance, washing goods and taking people’s temperatures.
Supermarkets have created entirely new roles to deal with queuing and crowd control, part of the tens of thousands of new jobs created across the sector.
Companies are ‘scheduling’ staff by staggering start, lunch and finish times to reduce load on shared areas such as entrances and lifts. Shared amenities such as canteens need to be expanded for both kitchen staff and wider staff.
Staff from architect firm Gensler’s Beijing office have written about what a typical day of new normal looks like in China. They talk about getting to and from work, their working and meeting arrangements and the technology they are using.
Hong Kong now has single digit cases a day, and restaurants there have remained open throughout their lockdown, with temperature checks taking place and people giving their personal information for future contact-tracing. Most Hong Kong restaurants require masks and the use of hand sanitisers on entry and provide paper bags for customers to put their masks in while they eat.
2. How can you design your business so that you are able to implement and relax procedures as and when required?
Flexibility is important because:
Until we find a vaccine, the government is likely to reduce and then ramp up lockdown measures as the infection rate fluctuates.
There is still a possibility there could be a second wave of infection once we get back to something resembling normality.
We think it’s useful to think about the measures that businesses need to take as a series of variables that can be intensified depending on government policy.
Customer variables -
Limits on customer numbers in stores.
Rules about the proximity of people and furniture such as tables.
Mandatory use of hand sanitiser, masks and/or gloves (potentially to a requisite standard).
Safe storage for PPE if being removed.
Temperature checks on entry.
Handing over personal information (for contact tracing).
Adhering to floor markings and respecting physical barriers.
Internal / supplier variables -
Temperature checks on entry.
Processes for washing and checking of incoming goods, which could be a range of approaches depending on where the goods have originated.
Staggering of start, lunch and meal times. Working from home policies.
‘No-contact’ delivery policy throughout the supply chain.
Sourcing only from places where a level of similar preventative measures have been taken.
Specific technology to be used, for instance to help with social distancing.
To get a sense of what a full list of social distancing variables might look like, check the government’s guidelines for business. A challenge for the UK government will be setting levels of lockdown that can be easily communicated to customers and safely and simply activated by businesses.
The TUC have also published a policy proposal on ensuring a safe return to work.
What happens when some of these variables have knock-on effects to public areas? For instance, with more queues forming outside multiple shops on high streets. This is an area where business and local government will need to work together.
3. How do you maintain and grow new areas of business while restarting core businesses?
Many businesses have used lockdown as an opportunity to expand their virtual offerings. For instance, when Helsinki tech conference SLUSH CEO Miika Huttunen announced the postponement of this year’s conference he said, “we believe that during times like these, Slush can help startups 365 days of the year instead of just the two days in November”.
Demand patterns will have changed because of the lockdown. We won’t get a full picture of how these have changed until we come out the other side so there are open questions. For instance regarding retail, do people want to go back to physical shopping or are they now happy with online deliveries? Are we witnessing a sustained rebirth of the once-weekly big shopping trip and more bulk-buying? This is a time of flux and opportunity.
A significant proportion of the world’s workforce is currently under lockdown. This has quickened the pace of the digital and environmental transformation of many sectors, businesses and supply chains so this post could have been named ‘The Great Acceleration’.
The UK has a thriving tech startup, innovation and agency scene, and so this is a time to think about what the world will need before we get a vaccine and then in the subsequent ‘new normal’. For instance, in the USA Ford employees are wearing a Samsung wristband that buzzes if you come within six feet of someone.
Belgian innovation agency The Board of Innovation has coined the phrase ‘low touch economy’ to describe how everyone will need to operate in the medium term. They have published a report that sets out how businesses should alter their strategy. One useful insight is that successful businesses invest in partnerships and R&D during recessions, using the example of the Apple-Google link-up to produce a COVID-19 tracking software.
4. What do you do if you think that your business won’t be viable to run with social distancing measures?
In particular, this will be a big issue for businesses in the hospitality sector. It is hard to maintain social distancing in pubs, bars and clubs. In the Eater’s Digest podcast it mentions that a journalist in Hong Kong felt like it was now an ‘act of aggression’ to speak to someone you don’t know in what used to be a social environment.
Because pubs are able to provide takeaways, we’re seeing some of them operating hatches to provide food and drink but this is sometimes proving challenging for local authorities. Where do customers go once they’ve bought takeaway drinks? If it’s sunny weather they will very likely take them to the park and sit in groups to eat and drink them. How is that any better than a pub for reducing the rate of infection?
Some restaurants in Georgia are opening up. TIME magazine reports that the Governor’s rules will mean that only 10 customers can be inside at a time in a restaurant with a normal capacity of 45.
This level of capacity utilisation won’t be sustainable for many hospitality businesses so radical ideas are needed. For instance, if the public realm is no longer required by cars, could the street itself become a location for pop-up hospitality? Streets could provide much needed capacity whilst also providing the feeling of security that you don’t get in a confined space.
Cities and districts are showing imagination in this area already. New York City is set to close some streets to vehicle traffic, expand sidewalks and create temporary bike lanes to offer New Yorkers more space to stay apart outside as lockdown measures continue. Hackney is temporarily widening pavements to enable more social distancing outside small supermarkets. Perhaps most ambitious of all is the plans for the Lithuanian capital of Vilnus to be turned into vast open-air public space, allowing bars and cafes to allow physical distancing during lockdown.
5. How can you work with the government on the restart?
Whilst the government is prioritising the health of the nation through the current lockdown measures, they know a damaged economy will affect people’s health as well as lead to lower tax revenue.
We think this is a perfect time for you to think about how your sector could safely reopen and work on a solution with local government. How do you bring a high street back into operation safely? What in-the-street measures are required from capital and resourcing perspectives? How is this funded? How could technology play a role? How can local government and the business sector best influence central govt policy together?
Most of us in cities are experiencing firsthand the positive impacts of less traffic on the road and we think there will be even more of an appetite for a more sustainable UK. Shortly before lockdown a House of Lords research briefing explored how the UK could combine sustainable and economic objectives. Many in government and the media are looking to the Glasgow UN Sustainability Conference COP26 (scheduled for 2020 but now postponed to 2021) to kick-start a UK green tech revolution.
It makes sense to lock in the positives that have arisen during this period but to do so (and so prevent slipping back unwittingly into the ‘old normal’) will require some active engagement with the authorities.
What to do next?
Think about how you could open up your sector and become part of the discussion - it needs your voice. Remain positive, lean, digital and adaptable so you’re best placed to make the most of new business models that are emerging.
Keep track of what other sectors are doing to manage social distancing. For instance, the architect Gensler has just released some considerations for corporate office tenants.
Contact your local government business support team. They are keen to hear from businesses - to understand your needs, to help you, but also, critically, to work with you on how to reopen the economy safely.
The Federation of Small Businesses have stepped up during this crisis and they have the ear of the Chancellor in particular. Small Business Minister Paul Scully MP is approachable. We’re also in dialogue with different levels of government so let us at Remarkable City know how you’re getting on and if you have any ideas that we can help you with.
Get in touch with Remarkable City founder duncan@remarkable.city. We’d love to hear from you. Let’s talk (on Zoom!).
Join the conversation with us on social media, we’re @remarkablecity on Twitter and Instagram.
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Good luck for now. We will get through this.
Duncan Ray, Founder / CEO, Remarkable City
1 May 2020