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Rethinking the Workplace

Now that the Great Resignation has played out, companies are gearing up for the Great Return — the return to the office, that is.

With COVID receding, people who have been working remotely for the past two years are gearing up to head back to offices, and companies are trying to figure out ways to make the transition as easy as possible.

“The layout of an office has absolutely changed since COVID,” said Allison Berry, a vice president at commercial real estate brokerage CBRE. “The square footage is about the same, but it’s being utilized differently. Employers are doing everything they can to make people want to come back.”

A company may occupy less space, but they’re investing more in kitchens and huddle areas where people can gather to collaborate on projects.

“The common areas are incredibly valuable to a company,” Berry said. “If you’re coming in just to sit, you might as well stay home. If you’re coming in, you’re collaborating.”

A Gallup survey found that 26% of full-time workers were still working exclusively from home as of December — about the same time the omicron variant hit the United States and caused many employers to rethink their plans to bring employees back to the office.

But with the threat of omicron fading, more people are venturing back to their offices.

“There’s a lot more traffic, and parking garages are filling up,” Berry said. “When we have the 70-plus degree days, the streets have a lot of foot traffic, and people are sitting outside having lunch and happy hour. People who want to be back are back.”

The pandemic showed both employers and employees that remote work is not only possible but it can also be preferable. As a result, many companies are opting for a hybrid model, asking employees to work in the office two or three days a week.

“Younger employees are very much ready to get back,” Berry said. “Maybe it’s their first job out of college and they’ve never even met their colleagues or their boss. It might be their first experience being back in the office.”

Overall vacancy in metro Denver has stabilized since early 2020, but the rates are still elevated at 19.3%. Downtown vacancy was 24.7%, and suburban vacancy decreased to 17.5%, largely because of the shorter commute times to offices in those locations.

Still, for the first time since the pandemic hit, more space was leased or occupied than vacated, according to CBRE’s first-quarter market report.

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Leasing momentum continued in the first quarter with 1.3 million square feet of deals closed — a 67.4% increase over the previous year. The average asking lease rate remained flat at $31.82 per square foot.

Despite the tenuous office market, construction continued during the first quarter, with 1.4 million square feet under construction. Notable projects include One Platte at 241,000 square feet; the Current River North at 238,000 square feet; T3 RiNo at 23,000 square feet; and Paradigm River North at 200,000 square feet.

“The flight to quality will remain a focal point for occupiers as premium office space, amenities and location are proving a necessity for employee engagement and occupancy,” the report states.

Many companies, particularly in the legal industry, are taking advantage of current market conditions to upgrade their space. And many tenants are using their space more efficiently. Law firms, for example, allotted up to 1,000 square feet per employee before the pandemic. Now they’re reducing it to anywhere from 350 square feet to 550 square feet per employee.

The Downtown Denver Partnership is contacting CEOs of all major corporations downtown and asking them when they’re planning to bring their employees back to the office and what the organization can do to further those efforts, said Kourtny Garrett, president and CEO of the organization.

“We’re working with entities like the chamber and others on relocations and backfilling some space,” she said. “We slipped into one regular mode of being, and now it’s time that we all enjoy one another and enjoy our city again.”

The vacant office space is an opportunity to create more affordable housing, Denver Mayor Michael Hancock said during an April press conference.

“We’re renewing the downtown experience to be better than it was before,” Hancock said. “We’re all well aware of the challenges and will continue to breathe new life into this part of our city.”

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Colorado Springs

The Colorado Springs office market appears to be even stronger than Denver’s.

About two-thirds of workers have returned to their offices in downtown Colorado Springs, said Susan Edmondson, president and CEO of The Downtown Partnership of Colorado Springs.

“I’m not anticipating that to change too much,” she said. “We had a very tight office market pre-COVID.”

What she has noticed are that certain days of the week see more workers downtown than others. Mondays and Fridays, people tend to work from home, while Wednesday appears to be a peak day for workers to be in the office.

“Three days a week is looking like the pattern for certain companies,” Edmondson said. “A lot of jobs are relational, and people need to connect with each other. We think downtown will still offer that unique environment.”

While lunch business is down, the necessity of people connecting with each other to work on projects will help restaurants and coffee shops as workers venture out of their offices to spaces that encourage collaboration.

Downtown Colorado Springs also has worked hard in the past few years to attract residents to the city center by creating more housing. The city has about 3,000 housing units that have been recently completed, are under construction or are breaking ground and another few thousand in the near-term pipeline.

“Those people may work all day from home in their apartments, but they’ll go out for coffee or a break, and that’s essential to keeping our small businesses going,” Edmondson said.

Nearly 492,000 square feet of positive net absorption was recorded in the second half of 2021 — more than double the amount recorded in the first half of the year. Direct vacancy increased to 9.9%, while total availability decreased to 11.9%

While some people have returned to the office, others have found that it’s just as easy and efficient to work from home.

“They’re comfortable with their setup and they want to skip the commute,” said Jared May, senior associate in CBRE’s Colorado Springs office.

That’s causing employers to reconfigure their floor plans to more efficiently accommodate the reduction of people in the office. And while the square footage per employee is trending downward, Colorado’s population continues to grow, so there are more employees.

“Buildings that have done better offer more amenities, whether it’s exercise or a coffee shop or other amenities within a building but also in the office spaces themselves,” May said. “Because of the way we’re working, more companies are offering a hybrid work experience — places where someone can come in and plug in. You don’t need your own office or workspace. You can share those spaces.”

 

(THIS ARTICLE ORIGINALLY APPEARED IN COLORADOBIZ PRINT MAGAZINE SUMMER EDITION – PUBLISHED JUNE, 2022)

Brother, Can You Spare a Round?

Green fee coupons and punch cards. Walk-on primetime rounds and twilight deals. Group discounts. Wink-wink sales pitches from private clubs. And, best of all, beautiful, birdie-bearing conditions on golf courses private, public and municipal.

Colorado golfers, the golf industry wanted us that badly. Course operators tried everything, from luring newbies with introductory clinics — some accompanied by wine and cheese — to training staff on being nicer. Still, their business refused to grow, so they buttered our bread with sweet deals.

Then, on a lovely spring day in 2020, a pandemic stopped the world and jumpstarted golf, which showed itself to be a safely distanced yet highly social form of exercise for people of all ages – especially the white-collar worker who could shut down work-from-home for a late-afternoon weekday 18.

Now, Tom Buzbee, director of golf at Flatirons Golf Course, can’t get out and play a round with his wife because his Boulder municipal course is so busy he’s got to go online at midnight a week before he wants to play. “We’re getting trampled,” he says. “Twilight is evil. Why would I offer a discount? Greensaver, Golfnow, they’re long gone. I kicked them in the trash. There is no discounting anything, because I can sell those tee-times at full price. And this golf course had struggled for years to break even. We’re finally able to hold our head above water.”

Ed Mate, executive director of the Colorado Golf Association, found himself getting up at midnight to try to get a particular tee-time at the new City Park in Denver – and failing! The CGA membership, made up of all the Coloradans who join affiliated clubs, increased an unprecedented 10 percent, to nearly 70,000. “Why should the operator do anything to incentivize in this market?” Mate says. “Just the opposite. If you play (CGA home course) CommonGround on a Tuesday, you’re going to pay the same amount you’re going to pay on Saturday, because the new worker has that flexibility. What I see as the smart strategy when it comes to discounts and incentives now is no strategy.”

Simple economics, says J.J. Keegan, who consults with daily fee and private courses to optimize profits: “For so many years, we have dealt with such an excess of supply and discounting of the rates that have resulted in many courses barely breaking even, deferring capital expenditures. And what we’ve seen in the last two years is a return to where golf courses are now generating cash flow. Revenue was up 20 percent last year, so it’s not good for the golfer.”

It might be good for the golfer who can afford $65,000 to join the Club at Ravenna, the only private club in the Denver Metro area without a waiting list. But even there, with a new clubhouse due to open this spring, initiation increased $20,000 the first of the year.

The rest of us can’t get a tee time, much less a sweet deal. Loyalty means nothing, unless you’re talking about the perks that come along with the Denver Golf Loyalty Card. And that, by the way, was free last year but now costs $40.

It’s not going to be a good year for the pre-COVID golfers used to being spoiled, coddled and courted. Here are five trends we’ll see instead in 2022.

Erik Brolin Ddyr4bsyibs Unsplash

1. The end of emergency golf

“In this market, if you think for one moment on a beautiful summer day that you’re going to call a property and find availability, it’s like trying to get Valentine’s Day dinner reservations at 7 o’clock by calling the night before,” says Fossil Trace Golf Club head professional Jim Hajek. “It’s not going to happen. If it is, if there’s currently space available on your golf course, they should just plow the place under.”

Hajek estimates that his course filled 98 percent of its tee times the last two years. Scott Rethlake, director of golf for Denver, says simply that on beautiful days, the city’s six 18-hole courses are full.

In the old days, one might hang out at the putting green (or the bar) hoping for an opening, particularly in the late afternoons.

“We’ve changed behavior so that people are getting better at cancelling,” Hajek says. “You could be hanging out here quite a while with the hope of getting on and actually not be able to get on. Which I hate because we’re here to take care of people and that doesn’t feel right to me.”

So if you don’t have a tee-time in 2022, you might as well stay home.

2. Waiting lists and higher fees for private courses

Private clubs in the area won the hearts of their members by providing what Mike Hestera, general manager of the Club at Rolling Hills, calls “safe haven” during the heart of the pandemic. “We were a place where our members felt safe,” he says. “They were outdoors and had an opportunity to recreate and enjoy one another’s company. And instead of going to their old standard restaurant where they weren’t quite comfortable, they’d come to the club.”

Families, especially, took to golf as they never had before. Initiation fees and monthly dues increased, and clubs like Cherry Hills, Lakewood and the Country Club at Castle Pines made assessments for new amenities and clubhouses. Nonexistent waiting lists grew long.

“For a full golf membership, it’s a three to four-year wait to get into Rolling Hills,” Hestera says. “Over the course of the last year, our club has seen record usage – probably three years’ worth of golf in two years. That sounds great, but there are challenges to that.”

Andrew Shelley Yu6z Fia1ls UnsplashInside the gates at Ravenna, Director of Golf George Kahrhoff set up a system where he’d greet members in the parking lot, get clubs loaded onto carts, take food and drink orders and call the restaurant, which would put everything on a table for pickup. One day, he noticed that a member of another club was playing as a guest for the third or fourth time.

“What, you can’t get onto your own course?” Kahrhoff said, half kidding.

“I can’t!” the man said. “I have to come over here as a guest to play.”

“There was an uptick in people joining clubs because they had trouble getting tee-times,” said CGA’s Mate. “Then they found they were in a club and they still couldn’t get a tee-time!”

Ravenna, still short of the cap of 395 golf members set by owner Kevin Collins, added 39 in 2020 and 103 in 2021. Its location south of Littleton’s Chatfield Park had handcuffed sales until the advent of work-from-home and a real estate boom that is expected to bring as many as 12,000 homes to nearby Sterling Ranch. Now, all of its 243 lots are sold, and Kahrhoff continues to get membership inquiries from public golfers fed up with the tee-time frenzy and five-hour rounds.

“The No. 1 thing people want is open tee-times,” says Kahrhoff, who has trained members to use an app to find last-minute slots on the course. “Second is pace of play. And third is course conditions.”

3. The grass is definitely not greener on the other side of COVID

With November came Colorado golf’s official offseason, when rain and snow nurture the dormant grass on the fairways and greens for spring.

But the fall rolled in as dry as the summer had rolled out. Aurora set up a closure rotation so that each course periodically had a day off. Foothills and Flatirons prohibited golf carts altogether. Most courses with continuous cart paths went cart-path only. And Denver shocked its players, many of them used to years of low rates and perks, by raising cart fees $6 a person until May 1.

“We wanted to give our golfers an opportunity to ride if they wanted to,” Rethlake says. “But we had to figure out a way to raise some additional funds to pay for repairing that damage come springtime.”

It’s not even about newbies doing wheelies on the turf: This was the price of normal wear and tear with courses filled to capacity in a drought.

“A lot of times in the winter, golfers say, ‘I should pay a reduced green fee because I’m not getting in-season conditions,’ ” Mate says. “And my answer is, ‘No, you should pay twice the green fee because you’re doing 10 times the damage when you’re out there.’ With climate change, we’re having to think a little bit differently, and maybe we’re going to have to just close our golf courses in the winter. If there was an initiative among superintendents to close in November, December, January every year, oh, it would be 100 percent. But the revenue is nice to have.”

4. Charity ends at the clubhouse

Have a group of 40 that wants to run a little fund-raising tournament with tee prizes and a post-round luncheon? Better have 10 players up at midnight to get those tee times.

“In 2022, we project that golf courses will not be holding tournaments or outings less than the full capacity of a golf course, at 144 players,” says the consultant Keegan. “An outing of 40 players is going to have difficulty finding courses that are going to be willing to host them. The additional requirements of staging it, scoring it, hosting it make it far more labor intensive than just play.”

And why bother with extra work when those tee-times are flying off the shelves? “Tournaments were always a big part of financial viability,” says Buzbee, whose Flatirons went from averaging 32,000 rounds annually to 48,000 the past two years. “We used to give the groups discounted green fees, free range balls. I’m filling the tee-sheet with full-price-paying people every day. We don’t need to have an outing or a group or an event. If we do, I charge them full price.”

Thumbnail Optimist RangePrivate courses traditionally bring in extra income with Monday tournaments and outings. But many have curtailed access. They have double incentive to protect tee times from the public: There’s too much tee-time demand inside the club, and a new law taxes the member-owned 501(c)(7) on revenue it brings in from the outside.

Even state championships and USGA qualifiers are scrambling for venues.

“We rely on the generosity of golf courses to host our tournaments,” Mate says. “It’s always been hard, and now it’s becoming impossible because the membership is playing a lot of golf. They don’t want to displace their members.”

5. Think ahead, way ahead, and pay the (dynamic) price

There’s still hope for the public golfer. It’s a good time to join a league, if you can find one with openings, or buy the Denver Golf Loyalty Card for $40 for tee-time access 14 days in advance instead of seven.

The most upscale Denver Metro public-access courses – Fossil Trace, Arrowhead, Bear Dance, Green Valley Ranch and the Ridge at Castle Pines – offer 90-day advance tee times at a premium. Fossil Trace started taking bookings for the entire season March 1, and next year may start as early as Dec. 1. So if you have friends visiting or a special occasion ahead and you don’t mind the extra cost, you can lock in your round. At those courses, you can also check availability online before bothering to get up at midnight for one of those less expensive seven-day-advance tee times.

And at those courses, it’s quite possible you will pay a different fee than the golfer behind you, just as you paid a different fare than the passenger next to you on the plane. Dynamic pricing – or, at Fossil Trace, “capacity” pricing – will turn green fees into moving targets that rise with demand over the course of the season.

Says Mate: “Much like the airline industry, the hotel industry, the rental car industry, we have a product that is perishable, and if it sits on the lot and doesn’t get used, you make no money. Those industries I just mentioned have been using dynamic pricing for a long time. Golf traditionally stayed out of that. Being nimble and forward thinking is not exactly golf’s space. But now, thanks to the market, dynamic pricing has arrived.”

Forward thinkers like Tom Buzbee worry about what all this means for the game’s future. He runs a free evening program for newbies, setting them up with clubs, balls and a pushcart, then walking No. 1 out and No. 2 back to the clubhouse, playing from the 150-yard marker just to get them comfortable on the course. “I feel bad,” he says. “The new players don’t have a spot to play because all the committed players are snatching them all up online at 1 o’clock in the morning. The Vail lift lines are not good to grow the interest in skiing. You have to have room for people

What’s a golfer gotta do?

Morning golfers have begun to complain about having to set alarms and wake up in the middle of their nights just to get into the midnight queue to secure a weekday foursome. After all, concert-goers can sleep in until 10 and still get tickets to Red Rocks.

“It was never an issue before because the supply was greater than the demand,” says Denver’s director of golf, Scott Rethlake. “In 10 years, no one mentioned it, no one complained about it in focus groups. Now in the last couple weeks, five people have said something to me about it.”

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In February, Denver Golf responded by moving the tee-time opening from midnight to 7 p.m. Here’s how public golfers can get tee times on the busy courses of the Denver, Aurora or South Suburban recreation districts.

Aurora (Aurora Hills, Meadow Hills, Murphy Creek, Saddle Rock, Spring Hill): Go online at midnight exactly 10 days before the date you want to play. Or, take your chances when you wake up in the morning, and call the course you want to play. golfaurora.com

Denver (City Park, Evergreen, Kennedy, Overland, Wellshire, Willis Case): Players who purchase a Loyalty Card for $40 have the luxury of making tee times 14 days in advance at 7 p.m. No Loyalty Card? See what’s still available at 7 p.m., seven days before you want to play. cityofdenvergolf.com

South Suburban (Family Sports, Littleton Golf and Tennis, Lone Tree, South Suburban): Residents with a $5 South Suburban Parks and Recreation District ID card scoop up the tee times at these beautifully maintained courses online at 7 p.m., seven days in advance. Anything left for nonresidents becomes available 5 days in advance after noon.
ssprd.org/TeeTime/

If you’re just not a planner, remember, you can always try to scoop up a cancellation at any of these courses 24 hours before you want
to play.

Use it or lose it: Confronting the no-show

If you don’t show up for your tee-time at the 425-member Club at Rolling Hills, you’ll be reminded that another member might have wanted to use your slot. No-show three times at South Suburban’s busy munis, where rounds were up 35 percent in 2020-21 and revenue rose $1.2 million last year, and you won’t be able to make another reservation. In Aurora, if you don’t cancel your tee time 24 hours in advance, you can expect to pay $10-$25 or more. And at Fossil Trace, if you made a premium advance tee-time for July back in March and one of your players calls in hung over at the last minute, you’re on the hook for the whole fee.

“The point is, I don’t want to make one penny off that,” says Fossil Trace head professional Jim Hajek. “I just want people to do the right thing, and doing the right thing is canceling any unused space that you have so that somebody else can enjoy the golf experience.”

No-shows weren’t a problem in golf before COVID; there were always holes on the tee sheets. Now there’s always someone who wants to play, and pay. That alone has reduced the number of no-shows, says South Suburban Parks and Rec Director of Golf Bill Ramsey.

“It’s become so difficult to get a reservation, people are just happy to get a tee-time and don’t want to miss it,” Ramsey says.

At Flatirons, a high-demand municipal course in Boulder, Tom Buzbee has perfected the ultimate solution: Golfers pay up front for their entire group when they make their tee-times and don’t get a refund unless they cancel at least 24 hours in advance.

“I’ve heard course operators saying they were losing hundreds of thousands of dollars to no-shows each season,” Buzbee says. “Require payment at the time of booking. That’s what we do, and we don’t have a no-show problem. The only no-show problem we have is our annual pass holders who don’t have anything on the line. And they have been schooled. If they no-show twice, they sit on the bench for two weeks.”

Both Hajek and Buzbee say they’re reasonable about exceptions. The dad whose kid broke his leg and had to go the hospital was off the hook; the hungover buddy didn’t have to be covered if someone else was standing by the counter eager to take his spot.

Generally, though, we’re going to have to learn to think of tee-times as tickets, only conditionally refundable. Says CGA Executive Director Ed Mate, “I think in three years, everybody will be doing that.”

Birdies and bogeys, up close

Dean Ricciardi 08ipbe8gpww UnsplashSure, mowers will probably wake you up at 5 a.m. Your Ponderosa pine could be used as a urinal. Rap music from the cart speakers might interrupt your 10 a.m. conference call. And then there’s that window that keeps getting broken.

In spite of it all, living on a golf course is cool again. The amenities might include great natural views, nonstop entertainment, a restaurant and bar in walking distance, and easy access to the game. Join a private course, and you might also get a pool, gym, tennis courts and social activities. Live on a public course, and you’re eligible for resident rates and maybe an annual pass.

Here’s a sampling of Colorado golf course communities.

Grand Elk Golf Club (Granby)

The homeowners here bought the golf club in 2013, so a home here comes with a family membership: unlimited golf, with monthly dues of only $350. Perks include a mostly flat and well-maintained course, clubhouse pool and hot tub, excellent restaurant and busy summertime event schedule. Last summer was a busy one for construction of Fairway Villas alongside the sixth hole. Priced into the $600,000s, they’ve sold out with more on the way in 2022.

Meadow Hills Golf Course (Aurora)

Meadow Hills opened in 1957 as Meadow Hills Country Club. Today it’s one of the best bargains in Denver-area public golf, with a friendly bar and restaurant and ample practice facilities. You can walk the course for $41 on a weekend, and there are discounts for juniors, military, and ages 62 and up. The neighborhood has 1980s homes, townhouses and condos valued mostly at $250,000-$450,000.

Pole Creek Golf Club (Tabernash)

At 8,600 feet, Pole Creek offers three highly acclaimed and busy nines that make the wish list of every golfing traveler in Grand County. The sprawling on-course homes might be had for $1.2 million, but the community also has existing townhomes and the coming-soon Vistas at Pole Creek starting in the $600,000s. Beyond magical views, perks of living here include easy access to Bistro 28, known to locals as one of the region’s best dining spots, and an unlimited golf course pass for $1,575 a year.

The Club at Ravenna (Littleton)

Under the direction of Kevin Collins, Ravenna reversed its early reputation for being removed from civilization and too damned penal. Thousands of houses are sprouting up 10 minutes away, the course has been made more playable and a new clubhouse opens this spring. A variety of memberships are available, including a few golf memberships, social memberships and sports memberships, with access to amenities including pool, gym and restaurant. Hold out for a $2 million home inside the gates, or shop in nearby Sterling Ranch for houses starting in the $400,000s.

TPC Colorado (Berthoud)

Homes started selling here with the 2018 opening of TPC Colorado, which has since been so acclaimed that values are skyrocketing. Work-from-home cleared the obstacle of a commute to Denver, and it’s hard to find anything in the immediate area valued at less than $1 million. Yes, in Berthoud. The public can play the course only during limited windows, so membership (starting at $25,000, non-equity) has many benefits, including access to a 65,000-square-foot clubhouse with three restaurants and a resort-style pool.

Managing a Remote Work Team with Communication and Ease

Though remote work has been on the rise for years, the COVID-19 pandemic caused more of a rapid shift in the popularity of working from home — and it’s a trend that’s expected to continue.   

There are plenty of benefits to remote working environments for employers and employees alike, but there are also some potential challenges. For a remote system to operate efficiently, communication needs to be clear, concise, and competent.   

Thankfully, technology has made it easier than ever to manage remote work teams. Today, there are several different software programs designed to make remote workforce management easier for everyone. But, it’s important not to rely on technology alone. Stepping up in a managerial position to make sure your employees feel heard and understood is just as crucial.  

So, what can you do to manage a remote work team with efficient communication? How can you make the experience easier and more successful for everyone?  

Keeping Things Organized 

If you’re the one in charge of managing a remote team, the responsibility of keeping things clear and organized falls on your shoulders.  

What does that mean?  

From the start, you should set clear and realistic expectations for your team. Everyone should always be on the same page when it comes to goals, job descriptions, and how often they should check in. How you go about organizing your team is up to you, of course. But, it can be helpful to expect regular updates, whether it’s every day or in a weekly briefing.  

Make sure your remote employees can reference your communication strategy whenever they need reminders. The strategy should include things like:  

  • The kinds of questions that require a conference call
  • When to email versus call 
  • How to access you at any time
  • How soon you will expect a response from someone 

The idea of organizational development is meant to improve your company culture, even for remote employees. So, be as transparent and clear as possible with everything you do. When transparency is part of your team culture, your remote employees are less likely to be confused or feel “left out” in some way. The more organized you are, the better they will respond.  

Getting Everyone Involved 

Speaking of remote employees feeling left out, that’s one potential risk when managing a remote team. It can be especially problematic if not all of your employees work remotely, and some are still working in an office setting each day. It’s not uncommon for remote workers to feel lonely, isolated, or even worry that they might not be getting the same amount of work as a co-worker who comes into the office each day.  

As a team manager, one of your responsibilities is to make sure everyone is involved in the right projects.  

Technology makes it easy to overcome geographic issues. If your business hasn’t yet invested in special communication software or programs, consider looking into some of the following:  

  • Collaboration tools  
  • Video conferencing programs 
  • Screen sharing tools 
  • Project management systems 

Online whiteboards can also be great for group meetings, especially if the meeting contains a mixture of in-person employees and remote workers. Whiteboard collaboration can help everyone to participate, whether it’s to share an idea, jot down a quick note or question, or offer a more formal presentation to others. They allow you to work together as a team in real-time, and everyone has their own specific space on the board, so no one’s ideas will be overstepped or overlooked.  

In addition to making sure everyone is involved with the work aspect of your business, it’s just as important to make sure they’re involved with company culture. Remote workers can enjoy benefits like flexibility and the comfort of working from home, but that doesn’t mean they don’t want to feel like a part of your company. So, whatever in-office traditions you might have, make sure to share them with members of your remote team.  

That might include jumping on a video call to sing happy birthday to a team member at the end of a workday or dressing casually on Fridays. If your business has holiday parties or other events, get your remote team involved by making the party “virtual,” and compensating them for getting food delivered to their home if they can’t come into the office to enjoy a catered meal. Making sure everyone stays as involved as possible will boost your company culture and motivate your employees to do more while remaining loyal and happy.  

Checking in With Individuals 

Again, it’s not uncommon for remote workers to feel left out when it comes to office festivities or even everyday “water cooler talk”. They might also feel overwhelmed and sometimes confused by a project, no matter how clear you’ve tried to be.   

You can help to alleviate those worries and strains by checking in with your remote team. Consider hosting weekly meetings with the whole group to address any sweeping concerns. You can even take things one step further by meeting individually with your remote employees. Have a “virtual coffee hour” with them once a week, and set aside specific time to talk with each person about any concerns they might have, or just to see how they’re feeling. Showing that you have a genuine interest and care about their well-being can go a long way.  

It’s also a good idea to have an “open door” policy with your remote team. They may not have the ability to come into your office each day if they have a question. So, make sure they know they can reach out to you at any time if they have any questions or concerns. Again, make sure you’re transparent about how quickly you will get back to them or the type of questions that might warrant a larger meeting. But, it’s crucial to make sure your remote workers feel just as valued as the ones working in-house.  

Avoiding Micromanaging 

As important as it is to check in with your remote team, make sure you’re doing it from a place of care, rather than wanting to micromanage their every move. It can take a lot of trust to let someone work remotely. It’s your job to make sure they stay motivated and productive without proverbially looking over their shoulder every five minutes.   

Instead, try the following tips to empower your remote employees as they work on various projects:  

  • Give them a goal 
  • Allow them to work in their own style 
  • Show them gratitude for the work they do 
  • Focus on the end goal, rather than deadlines and processes 

Workplace stress can be a huge problem, even for remote employees. By taking the time to show your remote workers more trust and letting them work in ways that are comfortable for them, they’ll be less stressed and more productive.  

As remote work continues to rise in popularity, it’s more important than ever to know how to manage a team easily. As you can see, communication is one of the major keys to making things work. By putting some of these ideas into practice, you’ll experience smoother sailing with your remote team. Before long, everyone will become more comfortable with this type of environment, but you can put yourself, your workers, and your business ahead of the game by giving your remote workers the resources, attention, and motivation they need right now.  

Noahrue Noah Rue is a journalist and content writer, fascinated with the intersection between global health, personal wellness, and modern technology. When he isn’t searching out his next great writing opportunity, Noah likes to shut off his devices and head to the mountains to disconnect.

3 things to consider when implementing a hybrid working model

There’s no question that the world of work is changing. Shifts that were beginning before the outbreak of COVID-19 have only accelerated in the aftermath of the pandemic.

Among the most significant of these, perhaps, is the growing demand for remote work opportunities. And, in response to these important evolutions in employee expectations, business leaders are increasingly interested in implementing hybrid working models in their companies.

But before you make the transition for yourself and your staff, there are some important considerations to address first. 

Prioritizing Security 

Even if your employees are only going to be working remotely a few hours per week, one of the first and most important issues you’re going to need to address is cybersecurity. Protecting your data and your systems can be quite different in a hybrid working model than in a more traditional setup.   

At the very least, you should consider setting up firewalls and a secure VPN that all employees will be required to use anytime they are working, whether they’re working on campus or remotely. Additionally, you should ensure that your employees are trained to ensure system security in remote work environments. This should not only involve requiring them to use the secure portals you have provided but it should also include training in the safe handling of mobile work devices.   

For instance, employees should be required to password protect any device on which work applications are installed. They should also be trained to handle mobile devices responsibly, including ensuring that they know where their work devices are at all times. 

Defining the Role of the Remote Worker 

Now, more than ever, it appears that the virtual office environment is the future of work. But, no matter how important a role remote work is likely to play in the continued success of your business, the correlation between the digital office and the physical office is unlikely to be exact.  

And that means that you will need to clearly define the role, status, and expectations of and for the remote worker. For example, if your hourly employees are working on a hybrid schedule, will their pay rates be the same when working remotely as when working on campus?  

This can be a thorny issue in the hybrid model, because a lower hourly wage for remote work may incentivize employees to use the virtual or physical office space. On the other hand, wages equal to that of on-campus work may be unfair insofar as it does not consider the cost savings associated with working from home. 

When transitioning to a hybrid model, you’ll also need to consider how your workers will be classified. Will they be considered regular, full-time employees? Contract workers? Your hybrid employees’ classification status will have a significant impact on your business, from taxation to entitlements, to labor laws and regulations. 

Mental Health Considerations 

For many employees, the hybrid working model is the best of both worlds because it combines the convenience of working from home with the benefits of on-campus engagement with coworkers and supervisors. That does not mean, however, that all employees will thrive in such an environment.  

And, indeed, even workers who actively sought out a hybrid schedule may find themselves struggling from time to time with the mental health challenges that can arise when working remotely. Remote workers may find themselves feeling anxious about using their work from home technology. They may feel concerned about being able to meet expectations when they don’t have immediate, face-to-face access to their colleagues. They may simply feel lonely or isolated at times when they’re removed from the social environment of the physical office. 

For this reason, it’s important to be prepared to provide mental health support for your hybrid workers. The good news, though, is that such support isn’t difficult to give. For instance, you can help boost your employees’ mood when they’re working remotely by showing them how to create a work-from-home environment that supports their mental health. You might even go the extra mile by providing employees with a gift card to be used to furnish and decorate their home office for both productivity and comfort. 

The Takeaway 

Now, more than ever, employees want and expect to have the opportunity to work from home at least part of the time. And that means that the hybrid working model may well be the future of work. However, there are important considerations that employers should address before making the transition.

The first and most significant is the prioritization of cybersecurity in the hybrid environment, from establishing secure platforms to training employees in security best practices. In addition, employers must clearly define the status of hybrid workers, including establishing fair pay rates for remote work.

Finally, the mental health of hybrid workers must be nurtured, including through the creation of a healthy home office environment. Though there’s much to consider, with such care and planning, the transition to a hybrid model can be seamless and imminently successful. 

How to successfully collaborate while working on an international team

As a leader of your company, it likely hasn’t escaped your notice that having a remote team can reduce office expenses and encourage productivity. Not to mention that an international team brings with it the kind of diversity that is proven to have a tangible impact on innovation and profits.

Yet, having your team dispersed across the globe can make it difficult to ensure each member can collaborate and communicate in a way that results in success for the company, their colleagues, and themselves.

Therefore, it’s in everyone’s best interests that you put strategies in place that give everyone in your company the best possible chance of success.

Creating Strategies

Having staff scattered across time zones means you don’t automatically have the strategy planning advantages that in-office teams tend to enjoy. Indeed, strategy meetings in remote circumstances often suffer from a lack of engagement.

In a lot of cases, employees work on other tasks during the actual meeting. To avoid this, you must try and recreate a collaborative, engaging workspace virtually.

Plan out pillars for an agenda for the meeting so there’s a focused framework. Then use a shared tool, like a virtual whiteboard, to give a platform on which your team can start brainstorming strategic ideas around the pillars. Assign different colored sticky notes to each member of the team to create clarity around who is putting effort into collaboration.

Remember that strategic planning is rarely a one-and-done situation. There may even be staff in other time zones who have not been able to make the meeting but should still be given opportunities to collaborate. Make it clear that the shared document or whiteboard is open to additions for some time, and discuss these during follow-up sessions.

It’s also vital that you take time to keep the meeting notes organized and available to everybody so that each disparate member of the team knows the current strategic status and the route forward.

Providing clear minutes of each session, including innovative ideas and which members of the team contributed to them, can both clarify the roadmap and keep staff enthused about their role in strategic success.

Boosting Accessibility

Though remote operations certainly offer advantages, that doesn’t mean to say that it’s always easy for everyone involved. Your staff will experience common challenges of working distantly from one another, but it is also likely that they will have independent hurdles that they have to overcome. Therefore, you need to make sure there is a focus on improving accessibility.

This begins with making certain that each team member has access to the equipment they need to do their jobs effectively. A single, shared communications application is one of the essential tools any distant team needs.

Additionally, a part of your onboarding discussion should include checking in on your employee’s internet access and computer hardware to ensure regular and clear communication in the future.

Even making certain that employees have tools to separate their office and home lives—a desk and organizational equipment—can make a difference to their effectiveness as a remote team collaborator.

Perhaps most importantly, engage in conversations with your team about what elements they find personally challenging from an accessibility standpoint. Their distance makes it your responsibility as a business leader to offer accommodations for those with differing physical, mental, or learning abilities so they can contribute.

As much of their activities will be online, make certain that your tools are geared toward web accessibility. Make sure that your tools include easy navigation, high contrast colors, and compatibility for screen readers.

Making efforts to regularly talk to your team about their challenges not only helps to make them more productive but also demonstrates that you care about their ongoing wellbeing.

Addressing Discord

Your employees’ well-being, successful collaboration, and communication are also almost entirely dependent upon close teamwork. Understandably, this isn’t always easy to pull off when they’re not all sharing the same space. However, interpersonal issues that arise among teammates can go unnoticed and unaddressed for a long time, and this can prove destructive to effective productivity, and the general well being of the team as a whole.

The earlier you can spot and address discord, the easier it will be to nip it in the bud before it gets out of hand. The key is to encourage team members to engage and find empathy with one another. Contrary to popular belief, physical distance doesn’t always make the heart grow fonder, and can actually cause emotional distance and feelings of isolation instead. Create a regular open forum where employees can discuss their concerns and find solutions together as a team. This can be via a monthly video meeting or just an open chat channel on your communications app.

When you check in with each staff member individually on a weekly call, make sure you make relationships part of the conversation. Encourage them to talk about how they are feeling about the group, and gently identify problematic elements. Keeping everyone talking, sharing, and listening to one another is a key to empathetic communication. It can help everyone understand that their feelings are validated and their problems are solvable.

Successful collaboration and communication are the cornerstones of remote teams. It’s not always easy, but when you engage everyone in strategic planning and place a focus on accessibility, you give them the tools to function together effectively. With empathy and the right tools, everyone can happily remain in remote life, and stay stronger for doing so.

3 tips if you’re experiencing employee re-classification in Colorado

COVID-19 has caused many conflicts for Colorado businesses that have been largely unpreventable and also unavoidable. However, with advance notice and planning, the risk of litigation related to employee reclassification may be avoided.

In Colorado, many business owners are seeing transitions in their employee statuses as COVID-19 forces reimagined working environments. An increase in hiring contract, part-time, and freelance workers is being seen across many industries to save on wages and benefits while the economy recovers.

According to a new study by Upwork, 2 million Americans have started freelancing in the past 12 months.

If you are a business owner considering re-classification, or hiring a new type of workforce, consulting a business attorney to ensure your ducks are in a row may be the best first step.

Below are 3 hot tips to bear in mind as you shift elements of your employment structure that could help to ward off litigation and may keep your workforce happy.

1. Consider Focusing Efforts on Keeping Employees Whole

Reclassification to non-exempt status could raise questions and concerns with your employees. Addressing these concerns early may be your best bet when avoiding potential litigation. The three elements that could keep your employees “whole” are salary, health insurance, and PTO (or paid time off).

Salary

When you make the decision to re-classify employees it could mean you weren’t able to raise their salary. However, in order to try to prevent potential litigation, it may be crucial that this decision does not result in a pay cut for your employees. Opportunities for additional pay could be a good way to boost morale, as well as outlining the steps you are taking to ensure employees are receiving the same take-home pay they had before the reclassification.

Health Insurance

Health insurance is a necessity in today’s society. It is crucial that you assure your employees they will still have access to health insurance with the reclassification. Relay to your employees that under the Affordable Care Act, employees are still eligible for coverage as long as they are working a minimum of 30 hours per week. Having concrete answers and facts to back them up may help you to retain trust and openness with your employees.

PTO

Losing perks like PTO can be detrimental to the relationship you have with your employees. Your PTO policy determines whether a reclassified employee will retain these benefits. Revisiting your policy to ensure the PTO is applied to exempt and non-exempt status employees may create trust with your employees. Ensuring that all of your employees have access to these benefits could deter potential litigation.

2. Consider Keeping Communication Open and Honest

Your employees may confuse reclassification with demotion. Ensuring your employees that this change is happening to comply with government regulations and is not a reflection of them as an individual or their work could help you to ensure trust continues in the employer-employee relationship. Within this new status, an easy way to avoid litigation can be to require liability insurance from freelancers. Allowing your employee to name you on the policy may continue the fostering of trust.

Transparency may be the most important aspect of reclassification. Open and honest communication can ensure that your employees are not hearing rumors around the office and believing misinformation. Building on the trust you have with your employees and having these open conversations, either through individual or office-wide meetings, may only strengthen these relationships and could help you to avoid litigation in the future.

3.Consider Highlighting the Benefits of the New Status 

Reclassification could be a positive change in many circumstances. Overtime pay may be a huge incentive. The guidelines, such as whether OT pay is available or limited, should be clearly laid out to your employees. Using a time-tracking reporting system may reduce confusion and could make it easier on you and your employees when identifying inefficiencies and tracking your labor costs.

Reclassification may also result in more time off or flexibility within one’s schedule. If overtime costs are limited, there may be less pressure on employees to stay late or work outside of the office. Knowing and understanding the parameters could lead to better work-life balance for your employees – which they may thank you for.

Developing a business contract with a qualified attorney that outlines the agreement between your business and your newly reclassified employees could be essential to the management of data, information and the employment relationship. A business attorney may be able to assist entrepreneurs who are creating new employment approaches avoid litigation and safeguard their assets with their knowledge of the relevant systems. Consulting an attorney before reclassifying may be your best defense against litigation due to reclassification.

Ellie Lockwood is a preeminent female commercial and business litigation attorney in the Denver Metro area with experience in commercial litigation and business disputes, intellectual property litigation, and environmental and natural resource litigation. She is the commercial litigation practice group leader for Snell & Wilmer L.L.P.’s Denver office, and an instant resource to business owners and other legal professionals on risk mitigation strategies throughout the Mountain West.

Proven strategies to manage big remote teams

It might not be a well-known fact that before heading into the COVID-19 pandemic, around a quarter of the U.S. workforce was already working from home—at least a part of their work was being done from home.

Therefore, it is possible to get some valuable tips from the managers of these remote teams who are already aware of the best practices.

There are some research-based steps these managers can follow without taking too much effort for improving the productivity and engagement of a large number of remote employees.

Challenges commonly found in remote work include:

  • Lack of sufficient access to information
  • Complete lack of face-to-face communication and supervision
  • Distractions while working from home
  • Social isolation
  • Enhanced issues that already exist in silos

Tips for leading large remote teams

Although a large remote workforce can face several challenges, there are some inexpensive and fast solutions available as well, that can be used by the managers to simplify the transitions.

1. Have a schedule for daily check-ins

Although this may appear like overkill, it is key for the managers and large remote working teams.

Once using text messages, email, and phones sufficed but the managers that are successful in remote leadership are more inclined to the use of video conferencing for ensuring a face-to-face interaction that is lacking due to remote working scenario.

Since the internet is the main source of interaction, keeping the data and conversations safe is essential that’s why you have to use internet security tools to protect all the work information.

2. Over-communication 

Apart from the straightforward daily check-ins, over-communication is necessary especially while distributing tasks, duties, and responsibilities to the team members for achieving the desired outcome.

Lack of proper communication can be a challenge even in the normal workplace however when these employees are working remotely and are possibly focused on different and newer tasks, communication is of paramount significance.

3. Use technology

Until this moment we are all being forced down the path of the digital transition that will take most companies months to adapt to.

Tools such as Google Hangouts, Microsoft Teams, and Zoom that were already in use by many people daily are providing straightforward platforms for tackling the first two tips.

Many people will be a little uncomfortable while using these tools initially but after their adoption, this is a fantastic method for supporting the engagement strategies. You can perform several tasks such as unzip files with the use of technology.

4. Establish engagement rules

Rules of Engagement or ROE as they are called in the military, allows remote work to become more satisfying and efficient as managers are setting expectations for things such as means, frequency, and the right time for communication for their team.

For instance, you can opt to perform video conferencing daily for the check-in meetings while using the IM in case there is an emergency.

Set forth expectations for the best time of the day for this large team to reach their managers and vice versa. Also, ensure that the peers are sharing all the info as required.

5. Managing the expectations

It is always imperative to do this but this has become increasingly more significant due to the current environment.

As mentioned earlier, several companies and the large teams working with them had to pivot. This means many members of the staff are now assigned different tasks and this will affect the motivation and capability levels of the employees and therefore the outcome and performance.

Therefore, set clear expectations and ask for feedback for ensuring alignment. Do not assume that your remote team knows where they are expected to concentrate their energies.

6. Concentrate more on the outcome and not the activity

It is widely recognized to be a better practice for raising engagement from employees and empowering them. If you can clearly define the goals with desired results, you can allow the employees to prepare a plan of execution by themselves.

If they have the resources and training required for execution, you can expect some creativity and ownership. While working in a remote environment it is tough to micro-manage the employees in any event.

The best managers of large teams are more like coaches and mentors than managers. They are capable of understanding the difference between management and leadership together with the nuances that can be not-so-subtle. All these tips fall within the category of simple however not easy. All of them will need time, consistency, and attention. However, your team is going to thank you for using them and they will benefit.

How to protect business records and avoid lawsuits with virtual employees

It’s been a year since the COVID-19 pandemic ushered in a new way of life for most Americans. One integral part of this new way is that there are more employees in a remote work environment than ever before.

As offices took safety precautions to prevent the virus’s spread, they closed their doors and asked their employees to work from home.

With very little notice, most companies were markedly unprepared for the transition to remote working. They quickly found their way around Microsoft Teams, Zoom, Amazon Chime, and other tools to connect businesses and their employees online.

However, one key component of the remote work environment may have been overlooked.

Business Data Could Be Vulnerable in Remote Work Environments

Company IT and legal departments were left to connect the remote workforce’s dots and protect business-related information and documents. Many employees turned to their personal cloud-based apps such as Google Docs or Dropbox without having pre-authorization or vetting from their legal or IT departments. Business tasks were created, assigned, shared, and stored in these apps with little or no protection.

Making matters worse, employees relied on communications platforms like Facebook Messenger, iMessage, Snap Chat, and WhatsApp to communicate with co-workers about business-related issues. Further obscuring the process of identifying, preserving, and collecting business data.

If not otherwise instructed, employees may turn to the programs and technologies they are most familiar with or what is easily accessible to them. It’s no wonder that employees who work from home often use the same tools they use personally for business. To keep them from doing this, companies should try to be one step ahead in providing the tools for them to use.

This sudden shift in conducting business could leave companies open to many legal issues. Businesses of all types and sizes should consider whether to make immediate changes in how they handle their data in the remote work environment to try to prevent litigation and other far-reaching consequences.

IT Department and Business Attorney Collaboration

The first step businesses may want to consider taking is to ensure that their IT department and their business attorney collaborate. IT departments provide the technical knowledge and tools, while attorneys can provide the parameters and expectations for handling data remotely. Together, they can work towards restructuring document retention policies that detail how data creation and storage should be dealt with when working remotely.

IT and the company attorney may also want to consider reviewing policies on employee use of personal devices and apps that lack company management. Suppose employees are allowed to use their own devices to work remotely. In that case, the company should provide training on using them appropriately for work purposes, including instructions about retention settings.

If the company is part of a highly-regulated industry, it might need to provide devices for its employees to use. However, this doesn’t mean the company or its employees are off the hook when it comes to protecting company data. Finely tuned technical controls and robust policies, such as only allowing specific employees to access company devices or remote desktops, might be a good option to consider.

Maintaining Control Over Business Information and Communications

Businesses can’t preserve information that is outside of their control. Most do an acceptable job of controlling information in the office setting, but for remote work, they might not. Ethically maintaining control over their data is something businesses should consider prioritizing with employees in a remote work environment. When employees are using their personal cloud services for company data, the data could be outside of business control. It might not seem like a big deal, but it could leave the company open to many liabilities.

The company may want to inform each employee of their obligation to maintain secure business data, whether electronic or on paper. Policies could be used to explain where and how to preserve documents from an employee’s home office. It could also be useful to consider having employees minimize printing, keep documents in a safe and secure location, and shred anything that isn’t required for preservation as soon as there’s no longer a business need.

To try to ensure all employees are aware of the policies and can access them when needed, companies can consider:

  • Virtual training sessions
  • Having easily accessible electronic copies of updated usage, preservation, and document retention policies

Updated policies for the remote work environment may want to:

  • Discuss the locations and technology platforms employees can use to create, store, and share company data.
  • Include instructions concerning where documents shouldn’t be saved, such as personal flash or thumb drives or other communication devices.
  • Remind employees about their obligations to secure and preserve business data if litigation is or must be reasonably anticipated.
  • Have a method for enforcement that shows employees that the company takes the policies seriously.
  • Include contact information to answer policy questions and address concerns.

Keep Data Fully Protected

In addition to considering establishing a cybersecurity and device security policy, companies and their employees may also want to consider taking the following steps to try to keep their data fully protected:

  • Rely on two-factor authentication
  • Use encryption software
  • Implement firewalls, antivirus software, and anti-malware
  • Avoid employee use of personal cloud-based storage for business data such as Google Drive, Google Docs, Dropbox, and the like
  • Use a secure connection rather than a public Wi-Fi
  • Use privacy screens
  • Refrain from sharing devices, login IDs, and password information with anyone in the household
  • Save all content to the designated network, not to a desktop

How a Business Lawyer Might Be Able to Help

A business lawyer may be able to review your existing policies to determine if they comply with both state and federal laws, as well as the standards of practice for your industry. They can try to assist you with pinpointing any necessary changes and might be able to help you develop additional internal policies that may assist with preserving and protecting your business data and help your business try to avoid litigation.

Your business has likely encountered enough stress and added expense over the past year. You don’t need any litigation to compound that stress and expense. By consulting with a well-versed business lawyer now, you might be able to keep your business out of legal trouble in the future.

Ellie Lockwood is a preeminent female commercial and business litigation attorney in the Denver Metro area with experience in commercial litigation and business disputes, intellectual property litigation, and environmental and natural resource litigation. She is the commercial litigation practice group leader for Snell & Wilmer L.L.P.’s Denver office, and an instant resource to business owners and other legal professionals on risk mitigation strategies throughout the Mountain West.

Workplace wellness put to the test

Selfhelp
Illustrations by Adam Vicarel

Josh Wolkon’s bags were packed for Hawaii. But instead of boarding a plane on March 16 last year, he drove to Ace Eat Serve in Denver’s Uptown neighborhood, where he told 30 restaurant managers he was “shutting everything down.”

“I broke down,” says Wolkon, the founder of Secret Sauce F&B, the independent restaurant group behind Steuben’s Uptown, Steuben’s Arvada and Ace Eat Serve. “Over the next 24 hours – it all happened so fast – my COO and I told 180 people they no longer had jobs. It’s hard enough letting one person go …” Wolkon’s voice trails off. “Everyone was shell-shocked.”

When Denver Mayor Michael Hancock issued a citywide Stay at Home Order, “Employees in every industry were disrupted,” says Dr. Carl Clark, president and CEO of Mental Health Center of Denver. “The pandemic has impacted everybody’s well-being.”

A record 20.5 million Americans lost jobs in April 2020, when Colorado’s unemployment rate reached 12.2%, the highest it had been since the state started tracking unemployment levels in 1976.

While frontline and essential workers worried about their physical health, isolation and loneliness affected nine-to-fivers during a historic rise in remote working. Employees in every sector dealt with financial insecurity due to widespread layoffs and pay cuts. “You’re not in control in a pandemic, and that’s a very uncomfortable feeling,” Wolkon says.

 

Doctor

Mental health issues skyrocketed in 2020

Surveys conducted by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in June 2020 showed that the number of Americans suffering from an anxiety disorder had tripled since 2019, and the number of those with depression jumped fourfold. Compared to data from 2018, twice as many respondents reported seriously considering suicide in 2020.

One in 10 adults surveyed said they’d started or increased their use of alcohol or drugs, and about 41% reported an adverse behavioral health condition.

While there’s currently no data to support this phenomenon at the state level, anecdotal accounts indicate that national trends can be generalized to Colorado.

“The demand for our services is way up,” Clark reports. “We get 100% more calls on our crisis line than we did a year ago, and we’re doing about 4,000 telehealth sessions a week, using 3 million minutes of audio and video a day.”

Dr. Sammie Moss, a Kaiser Permanente psychiatrist, has also seen a stark rise in demand for mental and behavioral health care from people who didn’t previously pursue care, plus increased symptoms in long-term patients.

Lowfunds

Behind the Scene

Colorado employees might be experiencing two mental health conditions at once: grief and stress.

“Any time change is forced, you can experience grief,” Clark says, noting that we all lost our “old ways of life” in 2020. Clark sees every phase of grief everywhere he looks. “Denial, anger, bargaining, depression. Eventually,” he says, “There’s acceptance, and people can feel hopeful again.”

Many workers are also experiencing stress, which is our body’s way of indicating that “something important has arrived,” Clark continues. Stress causes “an actual, physical reaction,” he says, when it triggers the flight or fight response, prompting spikes in blood pressure and heart rate. One of the “elements” of stress, Clark says, is a feeling of helplessness.

“This has been the most challenging stint in leadership in my 30-year restaurant career,” Wolkon says, adding, “Having to show up to work every day and be a positive leader in the midst of all this, that’s incredibly challenging.”

Wolkon focuses on what he can control, a smart tactic any employer can implement in 2021.

Give employees time to be stressed

“When employees are stressed, the first thing to do is acknowledge it,” Clark says. “An amazing thing happens when we acknowledge stress. We move it from the reactive amygdalae to our frontal lobe, which is the place where problem-solving happens.”

Some problems can’t be solved right now. For these “uncontrollables,” Clark recommends, “Pick a time of day to be stressed.” That sounds bizarre, we know, but it works. At, say, 2 p.m. every day, let employees schedule in 15 minutes to sit down and think about everything that’s stressing them out. This way they aren’t stressing 24/7.

Communicate clearly and often

Now’s the time to improve in-house communication with clear, concise companywide emails.

“You can’t say things enough right now,” Clark says, adding, “People can only hear so much information at a time when they’re feeling stressed.”

Clark, for example, has told his staff at the Mental Health Center of Denver that the organization is not laying anyone off — in fact, it’s hiring. “I must have communicated this for four months before people could actually hear it because everything in the news is layoffs, layoffs,” Clark says.

Zoomcall

Foster community from afar

Research shows that social support protects employees against a variety of mental health issues, including stress and grief.

“People in their jobs are looking for three main things,” Clark says. “They want to be competent, they want to have autonomy, and they want relationships.” For those who were used to working on-site, there’s been a big “gap in relationships,” Clark says.

“Many people counted on being able to interact with others at work as part of their self-care,” says Moss, the Kaiser Permanente psychiatrist. “Employees are really missing those water-cooler moments.”

Employers can facilitate casual interactions by setting up virtual coffee hours and/or opt-in meetings with no agenda. Launch a virtual charity event, or use this time to establish employee-led committees that promote diversity and inclusion in the workplace.

And don’t forget to celebrate milestones and special events with team video calls and handwritten thank-you notes.

Be patient with parents, and demand that all workers take breaks

Many Colorado employees are parents who had to learn to work from home while teaching their children. “Now they’re trying to work in a house full of people all day long,” Clark says.

Employees are working longer hours than before because, Clark continues, “Their work is always right there in front of them.” Put a cap on remote hours to prevent burnout.

“If you’re at home,” Moss says, “don’t let work invade home life.”

Designate a specific space or zone within your house for office work. Then, when your workday is over, do something “highly engaging for at least 30 minutes,” Clark says. A brisk walk, cooking dinner — many actions can replace the pre-pandemic commute that allowed many workers to unwind.

Mhcd Ceo
“If we really want the economy to rebound, the mental health of employees has to be addressed.” – Dr. Carl Clark, Mental Health Center of Denver

Encourage healthful coping skills

“People try to self-soothe in different ways,” Moss says. Some stressed-out employees might be tempted to drink more and/or abuse substances.

And it’s not like employees have had much incentive to engage in healthful self-soothing this year. Physical exercise is one of the best methods for healthy self-soothing, Clark says, yet during the height of the pandemic local gyms were forced to close, before re-opening with gradually increasing capacity limits.

In public parks, nets on tennis courts and basketball rims were removed, at a time when recreation was sorely needed from a mental-health standpoint, but containing the virus called for social isolation.

Liquor stores and dispensaries, meanwhile, remained open, and their business really boomed.

According to market research from Nielsen, national alcohol sales outside of bars and restaurants surged nearly 24% during the pandemic. “Colorado liquor stores had a significant increase in sales in 2020,” says Kachina Weaver, executive director with the Colorado Licensed Beverage Association, which represents around 1,600 liquor stores around the state.

But there’s a caveat: Two years ago, when full-strength beer came to grocery stores, liquor stores experienced a severe decline in revenues. “This last year, what they’ve achieved,” Weaver explains, “is returning to where they were in 2018.”

And Covid-19 made 2020 a record year for cannabis sales. According to figures from the state Department of Revenue, marijuana sales in Colorado were up about $2 billion from 2019 figures — $9.8 billion in 2020, compared with $7.8 billion the previous year.

Wolkon has encouraged positive coping skills for more than a decade, through Healthy Living Week, a popular workplace wellness program. This year, Healthy Living Week went virtual, and 50 employees participated in October. Wolkon even hired a licensed therapist to address the topic of “breaking bad habits,” he says.

Offer mental health services as insurance benefits

In addition to health insurance, Wolkon’s employees have access to assessments, short-term counseling, and follow-up mental health services through an Employee Assistance Program, or EAP.

In 2020, in an effort to tackle a growing need for mental health services, many providers pivoted to virtual platforms, giving employers and employees more options for care.

Mental Health Center of Denver, for example, created a website, You at Your Best, with self-assessments and curated content for people who are dealing with anxiety and depression.

Kaiser ramped up its telehealth services, Moss says, noting that he’s had the ability to add new patients during the pandemic. “Virtual care provides me with the ability to see somebody in the metro area who wouldn’t have previously had the time in their day to drive across town,” he points out.

If you like the care-from-home model, Clark recommends enrolling in Yale University’s most popular course, The Science of Well-Being, currently free to the public online. The 10-week class is rooted in positive psychology. “It’s informative, and also really fun,” Clark says.

“If nothing else, as business owners and decision makers, make sure your health insurance offers a component for behavioral health,” Clark continues. “If we really want the economy to rebound, the mental health of employees has to be addressed.”

What role does remote work play in the future of work?

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Photo by Ken Tomita from Pexels

There’s no doubt that we are living through a period of intense disruption. Businesses across the globe have scrambled to adapt to the ongoing humanitarian and economic crises initially caused by the pandemic. Additionally, political turmoil has continued to both directly and tangentially impact business transactions across the globe.

With vaccines in production and a certain sense of stability slowly returning to life, the question that remains is how remote work will factor into the hotly debated concept of the “new normal.”

Will the revolutionary form of labor return to a luxury perk reserved for a fortunate few? Will it become a transcendent work option for all and sundry? Will it hover somewhere in between these two extremes? Or will we all be replaced by Asimovian robots within the next few years and the concept of remote work will be bunk?

Let’s break it down, shall we?

Remote Work as It Now Stands

Before digging into the potential futures of the remote work model, it’s helpful to recap just how the remote world has found itself in the modern limelight.

Remote work has been an option for decades now. As technology has adapted over time, the initial ability to “phone in” work from home shifted to one that included all sorts of online communication, as well. Cloud-based video conferencing software, workflow platforms, and countless other software solutions paved the way for an elite minority of workers to communicate and work from the comfort of their own personal workspaces.

Then the coronavirus pandemic struck, and businesses of all kinds found themselves shifting their workforce online overnight. This urgency pushed the languishing remote work option to the forefront, exposing both its beauty and its blemishes for all to see.

The Pros and Cons of Remote Work

On the one hand, remote work has been hailed as a revolutionary approach to labor. The forward-thinking mindset embraces new technologies, frees up workers’ schedules, and is even good for the environment. Companies like Twitter and Shopify quickly hopped on the bandwagon early on in the crisis, going fully remote within months of the pandemic starting.

On the other hand, the need for so many individuals to work from home also revealed many flaws in the remote work system. For instance, remote workers had to learn how to negotiate for a variety of unexpected needs. This included remote-friendly equipment, virtual benefits, cybersecurity, and even basic things like accessibility to work documentation and dependable internet. Work-life balance turned out to be a fallacy for many, with two out of every three work-from-home employees reporting pressure to be continually available.

In many cases, these challenges could be overcome. Collaboration could be addressed with workflow platforms like Trello or Asana. HR departments adapted their recruitment and onboarding efforts by setting up online infrastructures that assessed remote organizational needs and set clear expectations in the hiring and training process.

Nevertheless, the flaws exposed for all to see opened up a debate over whether remote work was truly better than the traditional in-person option or if it was merely different.

The Remote Gig Economy

In addition to the debate over a virtual versus an in-person workforce, remote work has also introduced the question of whether full-time employees are needed in the first place. In many cases, the answer has proven to be a resounding no.

In fact, in 2019 before the pandemic had even started, 57 million U.S. workers already operated as part-time, independent freelancers. That’s a whopping 35% of the entire workforce. Many saw the gig economy as a way to escape the 9-to-5 grind and establish better work-life balance.

However, the freelance model has once again proven to have its flaws as well. For instance, the ups and downs of freelance work have significantly impacted the mental health of many younger workers. Additionally, the pressure of running an independent business, paying taxes, finding work, and generating enough income can once again make work-life balance difficult to achieve.

The Future of Remote Work

From remote or in-person debates to the question of full-time versus freelance workers, the remote work world has certainly challenged the status quo — particularly in recent years. The coronavirus pandemic threw down an even bigger gauntlet by forcing the workforce to collectively attempt to adapt to remote work all at once.

As the dust has settled from the initial experiment, it has begun to indicate just where remote work may be heading in the future. As things now stand, it appears that remote work in a post-pandemic world will continue to:

  • Be a form of disruption that breaks traditions and spurs innovation.
  • Evolve with technologies like 5G networks and cybersecurity.
  • Be available to the highly educated and the well-paid — McKinsey & Company estimates that “the potential for remote work is highly concentrated among highly skilled, highly educated workers in a handful of industries, occupations, and geographies.”
  • Exist in a hybrid manner that encourages part-time remote work with occasional in-person activities.
  • Be a necessary skill set for employees who want to demonstrate remote-friendly capabilities like communication, independence, initiative, and problem-solving.
  • Remain available as a stopgap measure for future catastrophes.

Almost certainly, most remote work will continue to vary from one occupation, industry, or region to the next. While it’s not likely to be a uniform model of labor any time soon, it will just as certainly remain a mainstay option for many occupations.

The Maturation Process of Remote Work

Slack co-founder and CEO Stewart Butterfield put it best when he explained that “we all know that work will never be the same, even if we don’t yet know all the ways in which it will be different.”

The truth is, remote work is far too alluring of an option for it to ever go away at this point. However, the way that remote work will be integrated into the average employee’s life remains an open question. The continual evolution of technology only complicates the potential ways that remote work can persist in the future, as well.

The coronavirus pandemic proved that a work from home option can be both extremely beneficial and utterly destructive depending on the circumstances. It will be interesting to see where remote work continues to fit into the picture as companies great and small begin to look to a post-pandemic future.