As the events of COVID-19 unfolded around Australia and the world in 2020, all workplaces faced challenges. The Rural Property team at Inglis was no different. A progressive attitude to embrace change and technology put the company in good stead to deal with the changing nature of business. The company ethos to adapt, change and pivot has positioned all divisions well during the pandemic. The company’s longevity and ability to stay relevant over 150 years is paramount to its ongoing success. The Rural Property division is a department that was particularly well positioned to adopt change following integration of new computer systems and operating from the ‘cloud’. The Rural Property team hail from country areas all over New South Wales, accordingly a decision was made early to base team members at their hometowns respectively and work remotely. This was a precautionary decision to limit the chances of any team member being sidelined from work and potentially impacting the whole team. Rural Property Sales Manager Sam Triggs returned to Wagga Wagga and set up a home office, which meant he was closer to his clients and much easier to stay isolated, as farmers know all too well many self-isolate every day when they go to work on the farm. Richie Inglis returned to Mudgee and based himself there, working under the careful eye of Jamie Inglis. Zoe Philip set up a home office at Young where she had been working one-to-two days a week already. A focused effort to increase communication daily
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via Zoom video conferences was adopted and all the team
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members had reasonable internet access to facilitate file sharing and access to necessary operating systems. In an interesting twist, it meant the team were sometimes geographically closer to their clients and the projects they were working on, which saved some travel time. We asked the team to give us some insights in the year that has been 2020 and how their work life changed and evolved.
