In India, the spread of Covid-19 began widening towards the end of February 2020. Taking into account the need to ensure both employee safety and business continuity, Evalueserve started a phased initiation of work-from-home (WFH) facilities for employees. Anticipating an escalation of the pandemic, the IT team started assigning laptops / desktops to all employees, so that they could work from home. On March 22, 2020, the Government of India announced a complete lockdown within the country. Following the announcement, Evalueserve’s business continuity plan (BCP), WFH, and Employee Health Management plans were initiated in place to combat the following challenges:
- Ensuring business continuity for clients during this pandemic
- Managing logistics to make WFH possible during the lockdown
- Seamlessly continuing operations of critical equipment within office premises
- Supporting employees in staying motivated, fit, and productive during these times
Pre-lockdown: BCP and Employee Safety
India houses Evalueserve’s largest resource and delivery centers. While the country was preparing to face the deadly virus, we took steps to ensure the health and safety of our employees. The first stage especially focused on enhancing office sanitation, as well as maintaining the health and safety of our employees.
Hygiene and sanitation within office premises
We increased the number of hand sanitizers across common areas (cafeterias, washrooms, etc.) within the office. We also increased the frequency of cleaning and sanitizing areas and items (door handles, common furniture, etc.) prone to public contact. Evalueserve provided no-contact infrared thermometers to security personnel, enabling them to check the temperature of employees, visitors, and vendors who visited the office premises. Finally, we ensured that all company-provided employee transit systems were sanitized regularly to ensure the safety of employees and clients.
Getting ready for WFH
Evalueserve implemented the WFH facility in early-March 2020. Our operations teams started seeking client approval and transitioning to the WFH setup. With support from the IT, Admin, and Procurement teams, all employees received client-specific workstations to ensure a seamless transition to WFH. The Purchase team also procured about 900 laptops on lease, as requested by the IT team. We also regularly monitored all critical equipment, such as electrical panels, UPS, and fire alarm systems, supporting our data center.
Health and safety
The Admin Team focused on the health and safety of Evalueserve’s employees and support staff. The team procured and distributed around 3,000 N95 masks and hand sanitizers to employees. We also gave more than 100 masks to our support staff and distributed immunity-boosting homeopathy medicine to more than 800 employees across India.
Post-lockdown: BCP and WFH
Following the Government of India’s announcement of a 21-day nation-wide lockdown on March 24, 2020, Evalueserve announced mandatory WFH for all employees in India, including those working on client servers and networks. To enable a seamless transition, various teams took immediate action:
- The Purchase Team procured 70 more laptops to ensure there is no disruption to business continuity. Between the announcement and implementation of the lockdown, we had about 8 hours to manage logistics and deliver client- and company-approved workstations to employees in various locations in India.
- The Admin Team arranged for authority letters with employee names and addresses for the distribution of 65 client-approved systems across Delhi and Gurgaon. The team stayed in constant touch with authorities in Delhi and Gurgaon for approval needed to deliver these workstations.
Disruption-free services
The Admin Team took steps to regularly monitor all equipment within the office premises, as critical equipment (such as datacenter) plays an important role in BCP. During this time, the team received special access and government approval for a critical resources team to function from the office premises on a 24x7 basis. The Admin Team provided the critical resources team with masks and hand sanitizers, keeping their safety in mind, as well as tips on maintaining basic hygiene. We made provisions for the staff to rest and are providing them with three meals a day.
Motivating employees during WFH
Not only did employees have to adapt to a new work environment, but they also had to embrace a new way of living, which comes with its challenges. As a result, we started running campaigns such as Health is Wealth, WeConnect Challenges, Fun Riddles, Creativity Projects, and Brain Train. These received positive responses from employees. Although employees were unable to interact with team members on a face-to-face basis, team-building activities such as virtual team lunches kept them involved and in-sync.
Contributing to society
Evalueserve is committed to giving back to society. We distributed more than 600 food and health kits to our support staff’s families, as well as provided shelter for them. Our kits included useful items such as flour and rice (5kg each), sugar (1kg), and salt (1 packet). Our efforts helped these families sustain amid this pandemic.
Reflection of Our Efforts
The severity of the current pandemic has affected every part of the globe. Along with the rest of the world, we are working to fight our way back to normalcy. We have been successful in ensuring the safety of our employees and maintaining client relationships by following strict protocols and data safety requirements. The true measure of our success in handling this crisis lies in the fact that not a single Evalueserve employee has reported coronavirus infection so far. Some credit for Evalueserve’s robustness goes to the members of our infrastructure teams, who have been working tirelessly to ensure zero-disruption workflow. Amid the lockdown, we successfully delivered more than 263 laptops and desktops to employees across Gurgaon and Delhi.
The mental health of our employees is as important as their physical health. With this in mind, we have rolled out numerous employee engagement initiatives, which have received an overwhelming response from all levels of our organization. We believe that Evalueserve has adapted well to the new normal, backed by our operations and infrastructure teams. While our operations teams continue delivering high-quality project work, the infrastructure support teams are rendering the services necessary to make their work possible.