Life Beyond COVID-19 Navigating the Post-COVID Workplace
Q What should I do to keep employees safe and healthy in the office during future pandemics?
Make temporary adaptations to your office design and operations to maximize health and safety.
Require staff and guests to pass health screenings Establish an elevated cleaning protocol Install touchless technology Install cleanable surfaces Establish a shift structure Implement staggered seating Reduce furniture in collaborative areas Implement measures to control building access Enhance indoor air quality Designate an isolation room
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Health Screenings
Elevate Cleaning Protocol
Mitigate the spread of infectious disease by requiring employees and guests to pass a health screening.
Establish an elevated cleaning protocol that aligns with CDC recommendations to keep your workplace safe.7
• Create a contact-less screening process by implementing tools like Microsoft Forms • Click here for an example • Require a health screening every day an employee or visitor enters your office to evaluate the potential for new symptoms • Confidentiality guidelines apply to all results
• Install sanitation stations stocked with disinfectant spray, hand sanitizer and PPE throughout your office • Use an EPA-approved disinfectant to sanitize high-touch surfaces daily8 • Embed buffers of time between meetings to clean meeting areas • Ask the building manager to disinfect high-touch surfaces in common areas daily
Touchless Technology
Cleanable Surfaces
Reduce the opportunity for spreading infectious disease by utilizing touchless technology. Areas for touchless technology include:
Audit cleanability of high touch surfaces.
• Motion sensor lights • Automatic door openers • Automatic faucets and soap dispensers • Motion sensor flush valves
• High touch surfaces must withstand repeated cleaning with EPAapproved disinfectants • Click here for a list of EPA-approved disinfectants8 • Consider adding self-cleaning surfaces such as NanoSeptic • Be cautious of materials with applied anti-microbial finishes due to negative health impact
automatic faucet
automatic soap dispenser
cleanable high-touch surface
Contact BDH for a touchless technology or cleanable surface specification package
Shift Structure
Staggered Seating Plan
Reduce occupancy by dividing employees into shifts.9
Maintain social distancing guidelines without modifying workstations.
• Cut occupancy in half to make contact tracing more manageable if an employee becomes ill • Disperse team members among varying shifts to reduce the risk of an entire team falling ill at the same time
• Implement a staggered seating plan by instating a checkerboard seating arrangement • Discontinue free address seating • Assign each employee a dedicated work station for easy contact tracing
100% occupancy adjacent seating
100% occupancy
adjacent seating
Pre-Infectious Disease
Furniture Reduction
Controlled Entries
Reduce density by removing furniture from shared space.
Enhance security and decrease the potential for cross-contamination.
• Reduce furniture in conference rooms and collaborative areas by at least 50% • Place chairs at least six feet apart • Install reconfigurable furniture to adjust quantities as appropriate
• Designate separate entries for staff, clients and delivery personnel • Use a key fob system to restrict access • Add a video doorbell system to monitor and authorize access into your suite
50% occupancy furniture reduction allowing 6’ between users
3 person max
staggered seating
Post-Infectious Disease
Enhance Indoor Air Quality
Ensure your HVAC system is operating at a level conducive to reducing airborne aerosol transmission per ASHRAE standards.10 • Upgrade to MERV-13 filters or the highest level filter compatible with your HVAC system10 • Increase outdoor air ventilation11 • Disable demand-controlled ventilation (DCV)11 • Open minimum outdoor air dampers, as high as 100%, to eliminate recirculation11 • Keep systems running for extended periods, if possible 24/711 • Install a UV-C air disinfection system to inactivate viral, bacterial and fungal organisms10
Isolation Room
Designate an enclosed room on a separate HVAC system as an isolation room for symptomatic employees.12 • Instruct employees to retreat to the isolation room if they begin exhibiting symptoms of infectious disease while at the office12 • Advise symptomatic employees to vacate the office after their belongings are collected for them • Install furniture with cleanable surfaces • Install high efficiency filters and increase ventilation rates in this room12 • Train workers to implement the isolation policy appropriately
90% of particles with a mass median diameter of 3.0 are removed by MERV-13 filters10
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