ASSIST Software's Business Continuity Plan amid the COVID-19 pandemic
Fri, 20 Mar 2020
We are closely monitoring the COVID-19 pandemic situation, taking all necessary steps to ensure our team’s well-being, while maintaining the business continuity that supports and enables our customers and the economies we operate in.
This is the moment to stay safe, support each other and strengthen our partnerships in an environment that requires flexibility and working efficiently.
We are still acting based on a high level of commitment and dedication to our clients, working in an agile environment and using technology-based custom solutions to continue providing our core services without interruption.
With an abundance of caution, we established the following mitigation strategies to ensure that essential operations continue during the spread of COVID-19 pandemic, and we also activated our emergency management teams to help oversee our efforts.
-
Transparent and Continuous Communication;
-
Safer Workplace;
-
Limiting Non-Essential Travel;
-
Work-from-Home Circumstance Approach;
→ Transparent and Continuous Communication
- We are committed to being transparent when it comes to providing information and safety recommendations to our team on how to stay healthy, constantly checking and aligning with the updates and requirements from the World Health Organization (WHO) and Romanian authorities;
- We are communicating with all of our clients and stakeholders, offering all the necessary support and providing flexible working solutions to ensure our business continuity.
- A dedicated team for centralized communication is in charge of monitoring the situation closely, and is responsible for providing regular updates to our colleagues;
→ Safer Workplace
- We have implemented rigorous environmental cleaning protocols such as UV disinfection in all of our offices, meeting rooms etc. and we are encouraging all employees to act responsibly to ensure their colleagues’ and their own protection;
- All kinds of sanitizing products, medicines, and protection masks are available to every colleague and can be found at all necessary locations (offices, bathrooms, entrances and exits etc.).
- All the team-building activities and team events planned to take place in this period have been postponed in order to increase our team’s safety and assure the protection of the local community;
- Face-to-face meetings are being kept to a minimum by encouraging the use of video conferencing instead of in-person gatherings, for internal meetings, hiring interviews, and meetings with clients.
- All colleagues presenting symptoms such as a cough, tiredness, shortness of breath or fever are asked to stay home and to remain in contact with their doctors.
- A resting room has been set up inside the company in order to provide our colleagues with a quiet place to take a short break, check their temperature or take medicine;
→ Limiting Non-Essential Travel
- All business travel has been suspended until further notice;
- Our colleagues have been advised to be vigilant with their personal travel plans in order to reduce the risk of exposure to the COVID-19 pandemic.
- All colleagues who have visited (or who have a member of their household who has visited) an affected area must operate remotely and cannot come back to the company until 14 days after the date they returned from the affected area. In addition, after this period, they have to get a new health check done;
→ Work-from-Home Circumstance Approach
- ASSIST Software has a comprehensive work-from-home policy and has started to migrate to remote working;
- Our IT infrastructure is able to handle a substantial increase in remote work and support any extra load that may occur regarding our service delivery technology services;
- The IT & Data Security department has prepared all the necessary equipment, and secure VPN connectivity and cloud-based services, implementing additional security measures in order to ensure the long-term viability of the core business;
- Employees with children are also expected to work from home while schools are closed by the Romanian authorities;
- The entire team has access to secure VPN and remote collaboration tools to ensure that our colleagues will continue to respond promptly, accurately and confidently to our clients’ needs;
- This situational work-from-home policy approach will be ongoing until advised otherwise by ASSIST Software’s top management or by the Romanian authorities.
