Planning and sharing a safe workplace are detrimental to being a business right now. Not only do you want to protect your investment, but you will want to protect your employees, customers/clients, or anyone else who might walk in your door. In the world of Covid-19, keeping a safe workplace means several things and we want to help you stay on track. In this blog, we will discuss what keeping a safe workplace looks like from a facility management perspective, as well as some additional tips for sharing the workplace safely.
Plan Your Inspection
With everyone returning to business as usual, it’s important to not neglect your building. It can be easy to forget that buildings need maintenance too, because they can’t talk to us and tell us if something is wrong! That’s where we come in. We can perform general and preventative maintenance inspections, due diligence walk-throughs, check for exit sign maintenance, code violations, and more. The first part of building safety is making sure your building is, well, safe!
Destroy Germs
Germs are currently the mortal enemy of any office space. With everyone wearing masks, getting their temperature checked when they walk inside, and having to remain six feet apart, you will want to ensure their efforts are not wasted. That means confirming the inside and outside of your building remain germ free! We offer both of these services for our clients. The outside of your building can be power washed to remove dirt, grime, and germs. The inside of your building can be sanitized with our newest sanitizing service! Our interior sanitation agent is USDA food grade approved by the FDA and is an approved EPA disinfectant for use against SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus that causes the disease Covid-19.
Maintain Air Quality
Indoor air pollutants can cause several immediate or long-term effects for you and your team. The EPA has done significant research on the effects of indoor air pollution, and a lot of that links back to the quality and maintenance of your HVAC system. Indoor air pollutants can also cause a lot of issues for those already living with respiratory illnesses, such as asthma. Preventative and consistent maintenance of your HVAC system can help your team breathe cleaner air every day. Omni Facility Maintenance can help you with your HVAC needs!
Ditch the Open Office Plan
The open office plan has technically been around since the 1940s, but it began to boom in popularity closer to the 60s as it became more popular to be transparent about company culture. However, as I am sure you know by now, open office plans are no longer prudent to the world we live in. Not only do open office plans decrease employee productivity and creativity, but it allows germs to spread much faster.
Without any cubicle walls or some kind of barrier, coughs, sneezes, and other microscopic droplets can travel long distances and stay in the air for up to ten minutes. This article by Inc. describes the travel ability of coughs and sneezes:
An uncovered cough or sneeze creates a spray of up to 40,000 disease-ridden droplets that travel at up to 200 mph to a distance of up to 26 feet and stay suspended in the air for up to 10 minutes. These droplets can make you ill if you breathe them in or, if you avoid that, can stick to your clothes and skin to infect you later.
With these facts, open office plans have no business being in our modern businesses. Our sister company, Omni Commercial Group, can help you turn your open office into a safer office for everyone!
Additional Tips
- Place hand sanitizer on everyone’s desks and encourage their use
- Paint your office with an antimicrobial paint that will help clear the air of germs and other pollutants
- Post hand-washing guidelines in all the restrooms
- Encourage your team to always be on the lookout for safety issues
When your office is ready to return to some kind of normal, you must be mindful of where your team is returning to. We want to help you ensure a smooth and safe transition back to your office so you don’t have one more thing to worry about. Give us a call to schedule your inspection today!