5 steps for a safe return to work
Philip Shepherd
21st September 2020
With many workplaces starting to welcome employees back after lockdown, the government has outlined five steps to ensure a safe return to work.
You must follow these five steps to ensure that you are providing as safe an environment as possible for your employees, customers and visitors to your site.
#1: COVID-19 risk assessment
As an employer, you are required by law to protect your employees from harm. It’s therefore essential that you undertake a COVID-19 risk assessment in line with HSE guidelines.
Under the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999, the minimum you must do is:
- Identify hazards that could cause injury or illness in your business
- Determine how likely it is that someone could be harmed and how seriously
- Take action to eliminate the hazard or mitigate the risk
Risk assessments are essential in places of work, but the situation must now be reassessed with COVID-19 in mind so that adequate steps can be taken to prevent illness. You should also share the results with your workforce and make them available on your website.
#2: Stringent hygiene procedures
Strict hygiene policies are essential to curb the spread of the virus. All workplaces should increase their cleaning procedures to minimise the risk of transmission.
- Increase the frequency of workplace cleaning, especially in busy areas
- Provide hand sanitiser, particularly around touchpoints such as door handles
- Encourage people to follow the NHS guidance on hand washing
- Regularly disinfect objects and surfaces that are touched frequently
- Hire professionals for deep cleaning and sanitisation where necessary
#3: Support home working
Working from home remains the safest option for employees. Where possible, you should take all reasonable steps to support this.
- Ensure that you have a robust home working procedure in place
- Educate managers and team leaders about home working
- Allow for open discussion about flexible working, including reduced hours
- Remain compassionate and reasonable when employees request flexible working
- Communicate regularly with home workers to ensure that they are included
- Support the physical and mental wellbeing of your staff through regular check-ins and offering paid sick leave
#4: Maintain social distancing
Wherever practical, social distancing guidelines should be adhered to. This means helping employees, customers and visitors to stay 2m away from each other as much as possible.
- Display posters reminding people to keep a 2m distance
- Implement a one-way system for foot traffic
- Use tape or decals to mark out safe distances for waiting areas and queues
- Implement a rota system or occupancy limit to prevent overcrowding
- Avoid hotdesking and sharing workstations
- Switch to an appointment-only system for visitors and opt for phone or video communication instead of in-person meetings
#5: Manage the risk of transmission
Where people are unable to stay 2m apart, you should do as much as practically possible to mitigate the transmission risk.
- Use screens and barriers to separate people where distance cannot be maintained
- Opt for back-to-back or side-by-side working in favour of positioning employees facing each other
- Implement staggered arrival and departure times for employees and customers
- Work with fixed teams or partners to minimise the number of people each person is in contact with
- Assess which activities are business critical and which can be cancelled or postponed
- Where face-to-face activities are unavoidable, ensure that time spent on them is kept to a minimum and avoid physical contact such as hand shaking
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Is a LinkedIn profile useful for job hunting?
Philip Shepherd
15th September 2020
Everyone knows that a CV is essential when you’re looking for a job. Just about every job advert from entry-level positions to executive roles will ask you to submit a CV as part of your application.
However, while the CV has been around for generations, LinkedIn is, comparatively speaking, a very new addition to the jobseeker’s toolkit. Even if you’re not particularly tech-savvy, or not familiar with social media, LinkedIn can be an incredibly useful tool when you’re looking for new opportunities.
Here are just some of the reasons why you should create a LinkedIn profile and keep it regularly updated.
It’s a professional network
LinkedIn is generally seen as the ‘professional’ social networking site.
While users often share fun posts, personal anecdotes and other posts that you might expect to see on the more casual sites like Facebook, it’s predominantly used as a business platform. Users tend to keep things relatively formal and safe-for-work, choosing to display a more professional side to their connections.
People therefore find strictly business-focused interactions to be genuine and acceptable on LinkedIn, where they might seem forced or out of place on other platforms. This allows you to be very direct about your skills, experience, and current situation. LinkedIn even allows you to display yourself as being “open to work”, so other users know that you are actively looking for a new role.
It’s frequented by recruiters
Of the organisations that use social networking sites for recruitment, 94% use LinkedIn, and 87% of recruiters find LinkedIn to be the most useful social media platform for vetting candidates during the hiring process. As your profile displays your work experience and skills in a consistent format, it allows for quick and easy comparison of candidates in one place.
It’s also a great tool for recruiters to hunt down talent and make connections in the industry. On average, recruiters have 616 LinkedIn connections, so they’re handy people to know when it comes to expanding your network.
Like many social networking sites, you can see the actions of your connections on your timeline. This means that you can see posts from second- and third-level connections that you don’t already know, offering easy access to new and relevant people in a variety of industries.
You can find vacancies that suit your skillset
LinkedIn has its own internal job board, with an average of 100 million job applications submitted every month.
While many of these adverts will have been shared on other job sites, you might find them more easily on LinkedIn, as you already share information related to your work experience with the site. By analysing the keywords and skills in your profile, LinkedIn’s algorithms suggest jobs that you are better suited to. Not only does this save you time when trawling through job adverts, it also means that you might come across different roles that you would not have found yourself.
Let us support your job hunt
As Digital Marketing Recruitment Specialists, Opilio can help you to find your next exciting opportunity.
How to dress for a job interview: A step-by-step guide
Philip Shepherd
17th February 2020
So you’ve nailed the first step and landed a job interview, but what should you wear?
First impressions really are as important as they say, and hiring managers may take just 5 minutes to make a decision about a candidate. But don’t worry! A little bit of forward planning will help you to make sure that your outfit is fit for the job.
Our handy guide will help you to figure out the most appropriate attire to create the right impression.
When it dies, swap them all.
For me, the most important part of improving at photography has been sharing it. Sign up for an Exposure account, or post regularly to Tumblr, or both. Tell people you’re trying to get better at photography. Talk about it. When you talk about it, other people get excited about it. They’ll come on photo walks with you. They’ll pose for portraits. They’ll buy your prints, zines, whatever.
Step 1: Research the company
Some companies are more casual than others, and looking at their social media posts and Meet the Team pages might give you a clue about what employees are expected to wear.
This will give you an indication of how formal the company’s dress code is. If it’s something more on the casual side, you might feel a little overdressed if you turn up in a three-piece suit and tie. A smart collared shirt and well-fitting trousers might be more suitable.
Step 2: Be professional
Even if you’re opting for a less formal interview outfit, make sure that you still present a professional image.
Your clothes should be clean, ironed, and free from images or slogans that could cause offense. Avoid wearing anything that could be deemed inappropriate for the workplace, such as low-cut tops, short skirts or ripped jeans.
Step 3: Aim for comfort and confidence
Some smart clothes can feel a little restrictive, and this can make you uncomfortable and distracted during your interview.
Pick an outfit that you feel comfortable and confident in; one that makes you feel invincible when you wear it. The more you are able to relax and feel like yourself during the interview, the easier it will be to communicate well and give a great impression.
Step 4: Check the weather
Make sure to dress appropriately for the weather and bring an umbrella if it’s going to rain.
Doing this will keep your hair and clothes clean and dry, make you more comfortable, and show that you are organised. If it’s going to be wet or windy, tie up long hair to avoid turning up to your interview looking unkempt.
Step 5: Prepare ahead of time
Don’t leave it until the last minute to decide what you’re going to wear! Check that everything is clean, that it still fits, and that you feel confident in it.
If you need to buy new clothes or shoes for your interview, give yourself enough time to wear them and check that there aren’t any issues like gaping blouses, pinched toes or itchy labels—and remember to remove the tags before your interview!
Now you’re dressed to impress at interview…
…check out the latest jobs that Opilio has to offer!
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