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Business Continuity > H1N1 Round Two: Is Your Organization Prepared? - By Chuck Wilsker, President & CEO, The Telework Coalition

Swine Flu Explosion? On August 24th, a Presidential advisory group of the nation’s leading scientists and engineers released a new report warning that up to half of the U.S. population could become infected with H1N1 influenza, nearly 1.8 million people could be hospitalized, and up to 90,000 could die. In contrast, the regular seasonal flu typically kills an estimated 36,000 Americans annually. Furthermore, the report notes that a vaccine for H1N1 will not be available until mid-October of 2009, when the virus is expected to be at the height of infection. This could place even more people at risk of serious illness.

Business Impact When H1N1 first hit the U.S., dozens of schools were closed for days or weeks, workers were told to stay home if they were sick, and many people cancelled or postponed travel plans. The CDC anticipates that more people and communities are likely to be affected this fall and winter than were earlier this year. Although the severity or the number of cases the H1N1 flu virus will cause this fall and winter cannot be predicted, employers are being urged to prepare now to respond to varying levels of severity if a more serious outbreak does occur.

In August 2009, the federal government provided updated guidance to help businesses and employers prepare for and respond to the fall flu season. The employer tool kit (available at www.flu.gov) includes two comprehensive documents:

CDC’s Guidance for Businesses and Employers to Plan and Respond to the 2009-2010 Influenza Season. Includes recommended actions that non-healthcare employers should take now to decrease the spread of seasonal flu and H1N1 flu in the workplace and to help maintain business continuity during the 2009/2010 flu season. Preparing for the Flu: A Communication Toolkit for Businesses and Employers. Includes a broad range of communications tools including fact sheets for employers and employees, workplace posters, template emails and text messages, and additional communication resources and web resources. Some of the key recommendations contained in these documents include:

Tell all employees to stay home if they are sick. Since it will not be possible to quickly tell if employees have a seasonal flu, H1N1, or some other ailment, all sick employees should be advised to stay home. This will help prevent spreading the flu to otherwise healthy employees. Likewise, employees who get sick at work should be sent home as soon as possible. Be prepared if schools and/or child care programs close. Some communities may close schools and/or child care facilities for extended periods of time, so you and your employees should be prepared if this happens. Develop flexible workplace arrangements. Ensure that you have the information technology and infrastructure needed to support multiple workers who may need to work from home. Additionally, we recommend a proactive approach to minimize the exposure of your employees to H1N1. As soon as you have a telework program in place, start having as many of your employees work at home as frequently as possible. This will both limit their exposure and give them training for when and if the flu reaches its full potential.

Obviously, these safety measures could have a significant impact on your organization’s business continuity. What would you do if 5%…10%…or 20% (or more) of your employees are ill, have to stay home to take care of other sick family members, or need to stay home to watch their children if schools are closed? How much will this cost your business? How long will your business be able to survive if its doors were closed for weeks or even months?

Teleworking Best Practices The results from the Telework Coalition’s 2006 Telework Benchmarking Study provide some valuable insights for organizations that have not yet implemented a telework program.

The objective of this study was to identify the best practices of public and private sector organizations with large-scale telework programs to better understand how their programs were created and how they have grown. Organizations were identified based on their reputation for having large, well-established telework programs. The study represents information gathered from 13 public and private sector organizations which collectively have more than 77,000 teleworkers and nearly 60,000 additional mobile workers. The participating organizations’ telework programs have been in place for an average of 10 years.

Many of the programs have changed focus since they were initially introduced. The study showed that most are now driven by facilities as a way to reduce the cost of underutilized real estate; however, business continuity is becoming increasingly important, especially for those organizations whose people and facilities were affected by catastrophic events like 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina.

Key findings from the study include:

In most cases, the telework programs are administered internally using a small core staff or a cross-functional team. All have “formal” telework programs with written policies and procedures. All jobs and employees are generally considered suitable for telework. The training programs vary widely, ranging from none to several weeks of intensive remote training. The trend is towards on-line training and tools. Virtually all of the organizations have standardized on a common set of technology solutions which include laptop computers, a Virtual Private Network (VPN) for secure remote access, and extended help desk support, often on a 24/7 basis and frequently outsourced. File sharing and collaboration tools are also being used to a greater extent. The participating organizations reported a number of unexpected consequences resulting from their telework programs primarily greater ability to maintain business continuity in response to natural or man-made disasters, and additionally greater flexibility for employees to relocate to other parts of the country, lower turn-over rates and better performance for teleworking employees, access to a larger number of qualified applicants, and fewer layoffs for teleworkers than their office-based counterparts.

What Are Your Waiting For? While many organizations back up their data and insure their tangibles, few assure that their employees will be able to continue working as a result of businesses interruptions. For those of us who have been involved with teleworking and business continuity planning the past decade or more, it’s baffling to see so many organizations that are not prepared when faced with what could be one of the worst health-related events we’ve ever seen. Now is not the time to take a “wait and see” attitude, but rather an opportunity to put flexible workplace arrangements (like teleworking) in place so your organization is prepared for round two of the H1N1 virus, or any other disruptive event that comes along.

© 2009, The Telework Coalition

www.TelCoa.org info@TelCoa.org 202-266-0046

Posted by Gaston Boisson on Nov 20, 2009 at 3:35 pm