Unless you have been living in a cave for the last 3 months, you’ve more than likely heard about COVID-19.
There’s lots of advice in the news about how to stay healthy and how to try and limit your exposure to this flu-like virus.
But how does this effect your business?
What happens if you, or key members of your team, need to self-isolate?
Should you be worried about future finances?
The story so far
After spreading across Asia and Europe, there have been some severe consequences seen, and some extreme measures imposed by governments in response to COVID-19.
After last night’s press conference, held by our Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, the current advice is to self-isolate for 7 days, should you show any symptoms of COVID-19, to try and stop the spread and to help protect those who may be vulnerable.
But how does this effect your business?
We have already seen the effect on the market, with the global stock market crash on 9th March 2020, being dubbed as ‘Black Monday’. Many of you with investments and pensions may have noticed a drop in the value of your funds.
At the moment in the UK, we have not seen any drastic impact on our day-to-day working life, with the exception of some businesses. But this may change in the coming weeks. As the virus spreads, more and more people could choose to self-isolate.
What happens if you, or key members of your team, need to self-isolate?
If you or your team need or wish to self-isolate in order to reduce the risk of infection, there are several things you, as a business owner, need to consider;
- Is remote working possible?
- With technology advancing so quickly, there are many ways your team can work remotely from home, to ensure your business continues to operate
- Do you have a contingency plan in place if remote working is not available?
- Not everyone can work from home, so if this is the case, do you have a contingency plan in place to carry on, business as usual
- Do you have systems in place?
- Whether your team are working remotely, or you have a contingency plan, do you have systems in place to ensure work is completed as efficiently and effectively as possible?
The CDC has also produced interim guidance for businesses and employers, which can be found here
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/community/guidance-business-response.html
Give us call to see how we can help you, and your business, should self-isolation happen within your team
Should you be worried about future finances?
There is currently a lot of uncertainty in the market, but this should not be cause for panic.
At some point the virus will have run its course. Things will get back to normal. The markets, and the economy, will have recovered. And many of us who run businesses will be smarter – much smarter – because of the 2020 coronavirus experience.
Businesses will need to adapt during this pandemic. Change is scary, but it can also be revolutionary.
This pandemic has also reminded us of the biggest lesson from the 2007 – 2008 financial crisis: Cash is king and the good times never last.
In fact, they’re very fragile. The smartest business owners who navigated themselves through the last economic downturn will tell you all sorts of reasons why they survived.
They’ll talk about how they cut costs, experimented with new products, partnered, diversified and downsized unnecessary staff.
Shouldn’t we be doing this all the time? Of course, we should.
But regardless of these strategies, they’ll also admit to one other major thing: They had cash.
When you have cash in the bank you make smarter decisions and better investments because you’re negotiating from a stronger financial position.
If you are worried about how this pandemic will affect you and your business, give us a call.
What are we doing, at MDH?
Here at MDH, we have several plans in place to ensure business runs as normal, not only for us, but also for you, our clients.
From Friday 13th March until further notice, we will no longer be holding face-to-face meetings.
If you already have a meeting booked in, this will still go ahead, however, all meetings to be booked within this timeframe will now be held either over the telephone or via online video call.
We believe this will not only help you as clients, but also our team at MDH, in trying to mitigate the spread and risk of infection.
By ‘self-isolating’ MDH, we can continue to act effectively and efficiently, ensuring all your business needs are met.
