Returning to the office? CEOs eyeing the trends
My company went to a virtual work environment long before the pandemic and we will
My company went to a virtual work environment long before the pandemic and we will continue to do so. I do believe the new normal is that society will adapt permanently to a virtual work world. With the advent of companies like Zoom and others, traveling back and forth to a brick and mortar location will become a thing of the past.
Dexter Bridgeman, CEO, founder, M•I•A Media Group
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Our law firm’s offices (both in South Florida and nationally) have been working regular office hours since the initial stay-at-home orders were issued in Florida. Fortunately, our firm’s technology platform was already built to adapt quickly and without disruption to a virtual “work-from-home” environment. In addition, our office has always maintained a skeleton staff on-site to accept, receive and send out mail on behalf of our clients. Our offices are currently open and employees are coming into the office at their discretion and on a voluntary basis
Luis Flores, managing partner, Saul Ewing Arnstein & Lehr’s Miami office
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We are encouraged by the improving COVID-19 numbers. As an essential business, our real estate offices have been open and manned with our support staff and managers on a regular office schedule. We are beginning to see an increase in our real estate agents coming back to the offices to work. We believe the current environment of managing in this new era will continue until 2021.
Mike Pappas, president, CEO, The Keyes Company/Illustrated Properties
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We are monitoring data points on a daily basis (i.e. case count, positivity, hospital capacity) and are encouraged by the recent trends. As an essential business, our physical branch locations have remained open throughout with varying degrees of prudent and responsible ways to serve our members’ financial needs. Some of our locations are conducting lobby service and others are drive-thru only. I anticipate all the locations to be lobby and drive-thru available (if drive-thru at the location) by end of September if encouraging trends continues. As for in-person staff at our headquarters, again, if trends continue as our tri-county footprint implements increasing phases of re-opening and in-person learning at schools returns, I would expect us to begin to transition staff now working remotely back to headquarters by end of October. We will do so safely, likely in a hybrid remote/in-person scenario. Our diligence with COVID-19 protocols enterprise-wide has done extremely well in serving to protect our 145 employees and their families during this crisis. We will continue to operate making decisions with employee and member safety as a priority and accordingly employ a very fluid timeline based on the data.
Allan Prindle, president, CEO, Power Financial Credit Union
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Because YWCA South Florida is an essential service organization, our preschool and camp programs have been operating under regular office hours for the past few months with priority on the safety of our direct care team and our children. In this phase, administrative roles that have not needed to be physically in the building will continue working remotely, allowing only 25 percent administrative occupancy at any given time, in order to minimize non-essential traffic through the program space for as long as possible. We will continue to adjust our percentage and timeline with respect to CDC’s guidance. With that said, because many Miami-Dade and Broward residents are returning to their offices this fall, YWCA South Florida is now offering “Learning Pods”, which allows working parents to drop off their children into a safe and supervised environment where they can complete their distance learning coursework and engage in enriched after-school activities.
Kerry-Ann Royes, CEO, YWCA South Florida
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We have continued to stay open with very minimal foot traffic. Our plan is to implement a schedule online so we can begin to encourage more visitors. We make it mandatory that everyone wears a mask and have hand sanitizer on site.
Mindy Solomon, owner, director, Mindy Solomon Gallery
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The Phillip and Patricia Frost Museum of Science reopened for public visitation in mid-June, so we have essential operational, administrative and husbandry staff in the building daily. Those whose job functions allow it, continue to work remotely. We anticipate more staff returning to regular hours in the office when the data and scientific advice demonstrate it is safe to do so. We are proactively preparing for this shift by installing dividers between desks, implementing other safety measures and are considering rotating schedules to control office density.
Frank Steslow, president, CEO, Phillip and Patricia Frost Museum of Science
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THE MIAMI HERALD CEO ROUNDTABLE IS A WEEKLY FEATURE THAT APPEARS IN BUSINESS MONDAY OF THE MIAMI HERALD. RECENT QUESTIONS TO THE ROUNDTABLE HAVE INCLUDED:
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