This is a guest post by Jesse Mullen, Director of Cleopatra Cleaning.
Cleopatra Cleaning specialises in commercial cleaning services on the East Coast of Australia. I’ve been at Cleopatra for 11 years, and we pride ourselves on our high level of communication and quality service.
As the world continues to adapt to the impact of COVID-19, I thought about what we can do in our business. And what other businesses can do moving forward. Four big topics stuck in my head.
1. Opportunities exist when you look for them
Unfortunately, many businesses have been shattered by the global pandemic. It’s hard to see talented individuals and beloved businesses close their doors.
We need to work together to help each other. And for those who have not had a large downturn or have been able to pivot their business offering, it’s actually a great time to hire.
The labour pool has never been filled with so many quality candidates! For example in the cleaning industry, with so many hotels and resorts closed at the moment, a lot of cleaners who have many years experience are out of work overnight. That means we’re able to employ quite a few of those people who are an amazing fit for our business now.
If you have an opportunity to help those who are struggling to find work, do what you can to give them a chance.
2. Set up your team for life after COVID-19
As a community, we’re going to get through this crisis. And while we need to think about acting now, we still can put things in place for a better future.
If we are hiring new staff, we’re mindful that they may look at going back to another employer when it is feasible. For casual employees in particular, we try build them into the schedule in a way they can work for us now and into the future by setting them up with hours that are different to their hibernating employer (for example early morning shifts if they usually did evening shifts with prior job).
Remember, look after your people, particularly in this time, and they will look after you!
3. Communication is critical
When regulations and protocols are changing constantly, it’s important to keep your team across those updates. And on top of that, it’s important for morale.
We use the Deputy News feed for all types of communication a lot more then we did prior to Covid-19 — from COVID-19 updates to cleaning updates to sharing internal documents.
The onboarding function within Deputy is also great. Good communication should start from the moment someone is hired and this sets a professional first impression of the business’s processes. After they have been offered the job, the employee receives a really nice form to enter all their details, cutting out tons of paperwork.
4. Focus on your customers
For cleaning and likely other industries, when the economy starts to reopen, there will be a big opportunity to not only capture new customers but attend to current customers who haven’t been able to use your services.
The key is to market your value to customers — and deliver that value.
