The title is ‘construction in a post-Covid world’, perhaps it really ought to be ‘…in a mid-Covid world’. We’re being optimistic though; we’re coming to the end of one of the most memorable years in our history and as the UK starts to roll out a vaccine, we are holding on to the fact that we will shortly be entering a post-Covid world.
There is light at the end of the tunnel, and boy are we dragging ourselves towards it.
When the UK government announced a nationwide lockdown to start on Friday 20th March 2020, we were as unprepared as every other business. Our offices closed, staff set up workstations at home, we asked our kids what the WiFi password was and everyone quickly learned how to use Microsoft teams. Only essential staff were allowed on to site premises to deal with essential contract hires. Needless to say, this was a baptism of fire.
Once the ‘new-normal’ of home working had been established, we found that we could continue to offer the same level of service as we had done previously. We were also working longer hours as, let’s face it, there wasn’t much else to do.
Fast forward to December and whilst some of us are still working from home, we have implemented safe, social distancing measures on site, and it is working well. We were very fortunate that the initial lockdown impact was short lived for The Hire Place.
The full impact on construction due to Covid-19 is yet to manifest. The Construction enquirer recently shared that construction in the capital of new offices, fell by almost half in the 6 months to 30th September. This was no surprise; what we can take heart from is that now two thirds of new construction projects in the capital are refurbishments, making offices Covid secure.
We adapt and we continue. And, this isn’t just beneficial for now (mood hoover alert), unfortunately Covid-19 is not the first and won’t be the last zoonotic virus (source: The Economist)
Refurbishing offices isn’t an inconvenience, it’s a necessity, we need to future proof against future COVID-19’s and avoid the impact we have all experienced with multiple lockdowns and now, tiered systems. We’re still working out the rules on that one – is it like the hokeycokey?
So, as we wrap up another year, a bizarre year, a year that pulled us apart but drove us together, we continue in our adapted normal, offering a responsive and efficient hire service to our customers.
We don’t want to finish this with the overused saying of ‘we’re here for you’, we’ve gone with something completely different.
We want to say a big thank you to all our customers and staff for all your support this year.
Have a very Merry Christmas and here’s to 2021 where we embrace the new normal.
If you need us, we’re here (entirely different).
