Whilst faced with the current global crisis, the power of people has been incredible. We have seen and heard of commitment and support like no other, in the community and in business.

Our key workers, healthcare workers, grocery workers, teachers, to name a few, have continued to push on to support others, selflessly and they deserve every cheer and clap they receive.

Behind the scenes, business leaders, health and safety and human resource (HR) professionals have not had it easy over the last few months. COVID-19 has not only posed a threat to operations but has opened up an unknown minefield.

Working in HR, I have experienced this first hand.

In the beginning, many people (myself included) were unaware of the seriousness of the issue. However, with our people in mind, as a leadership team, we ensured to raise awareness of the importance of hygiene and the potential risk that this virus could cause. Initially, this was received in humour. But I was very willing to risk looking a little silly, if it meant I was potentially doing the right thing for people.

Very quickly, things escalated. With our business operating globally – we were seeing colleagues in other countries being forced to change their way of working and saw the introduction of restrictions and lockdowns much sooner than our own.

Almost overnight, our own workforce started to take the situation very seriously and many became worried. Government advice was available, but limited.

As a business, we needed to be ready to answer questions, on a topic we had no understanding of. Yes, we could take some advice from overseas colleagues, but our UK legislation, our government’s approach and guidance was very different.

I still recall the first few weeks now. I would listen religiously to the Prime Ministers updates live, this would be followed by a call with colleagues to discuss exactly how we would implement what has just been announced. I would send a 6.00am update to our European HR, every day. I would refresh the direct.gov website constantly, until new guidance was available to read, explaining the detail on the actions from the briefing. Then I could begin to plan.

Who is vulnerable? Are we an essential business? What if a colleague has a vulnerable family member? What do we do about pay? Can we enforce holidays? Where can I buy hand sanitiser and thermometers when the whole world is racing for them?

Every day, I had so many questions to find the answers for. I had to be sure that I was communicating every update clearly, to all employees. Management reports were needed at a moment’s notice.

I was faced with the most challenging time of my entire career. On top of which, I still had my normal job to deliver, my own separate business to still run, and I also had to figure out how to work from home and homeschool two children under ten, while my husband was still out working full time.

We are now starting to see some normality. Our leadership team have worked fantastically to ensure that we have a safe working environment for our employees that need to be at work. IT have responded incredibly well to our working from home access needs. And, I’ll admit, the decisions I made were not always popular, but they were fair. I had our people and the business in mind, always.

I closed off last week by calling all employees and conducting a wellbeing check to see how they are coping, if they had any queries / suggestions and if they feel ready to go back to working in the office, when the time comes. The feedback was great. I am satisfied that we rode the storm well, given the circumstances.

But, it has not been easy. I’m sure for some, normality is still a way off and I cannot imagine how it must feel for those that may not see their old normal again.

So to all the heroes in HR, Health and Safety and Leadership roles – well done you! On the bright side, it can only get easier, right?