Témoignages

Image

When we first took action to protect our plants and employees from Covid-19, our main concern was about the health of our people. Our operations were identified early on as essential businesses, so employees were concerned about catching the coronavirus at work, given it’s hard to avoid close proximity with people in a production setting. As initial precautions we quarantined employees returning from vacation and asked those feeling unwell to self-isolate. 

To make sure employees felt secure, we involved them in open discussions to decide on procedures, with the help of  the Lac-des-Îles plant’s Union. Because we have fewer than 100 employees across the two plants, it was possible to make sure everyone had input. As a manager, it was undeniably challenging to stay connected and address employees’ concerns in the initial phase of the outbreak while we adjusted to being apart, but the challenge was worth it to give them peace of mind. We continue to communicate through employee-wide meetings via conference call and we ensure that the same messages reach all employees. 

We have put in place a number of new measures to stay safe while continuing operations, such as  staggered lunch breaks, dividing teams into smaller groups, intensifying cleaning protocol and providing all staff onsite with Personal Protection Equipment (PPE). Anyone external coming onsite has separate bathroom facilities to use, and we are limiting employee contact with the delivery drivers coming on site following discussions with our partners from transportation companies to agree on the best way to do so. The only people that continue to work onsite are supervisors and employees directly related to the operational work – everyone else is working remotely. It’s not easy, but I have encouraged people to rethink the way they work and really consider what is possible to do remotely. These measures have helped to limit the flow of people coming onsite, and at this stage we’ve not had any known cases of Covid-19.

It has been more important than ever to look after employees’ wellbeing and make sure their comments and requests are heard by management. As well as checking in with employees myself, we have also registered with an  external program, HumanCare, which connects employees to support services covering things like wellbeing, legal and finance, complementing our organisation well.

I can begin to feel the team adjusting to the new normal, which is encouraging to see!  

What advice would you give to those in management positions? 

1. Lead by example: Visible Felt Leadership speaks for itself. 
2. Communicate: Messaging should be clear and consistent, with no room for confusion. 
3. Lean on colleagues: this won’t be an easy time for anyone, and site managers in particular may find it stressful, so remember to lean on your colleagues, and ask for support when you need it.

Image

Since March 20th, the state of Pará, in the northern region of Brazil, has been under lockdown, just essential services are open like markets, drugstores and restaurants - working through delivery. On April 17th, the governor of Pará claimed new measures to define the time these shops can open during the day and reducing quantity people them can attend during this time.“The beginning of the pandemic brought a lot of uncertainty and concern. When the pandemic began in Brazil, we had planned how this would affect our operations. We were prepared when recommendations were released by health agencies and we had concrete prevention and containment measures and actions, ready to communicate to employees.

All the measures adopted were designed primarily for the health and well-being of our employees and their families, with the aim of minimizing the impact of this pandemic on our business. 

In addition to the recommendations of health authorities, we adopted several internal protocols. Employees returning from travel underwent a period of quarantine, and remote-working was set up in all activities where it was possible. As a measure of protection, and in line with WHO recommendations, some staff members, notably those in the high-risk group, are no longer working on site until further notice. We are also measuring the temperature of everyone that enters our sites and we have implemented higher hygiene standards in the cafeteria, buses, bathrooms and offices, as well as ensuring alcohol gel supply in the operational areas.

We are also monitoring PPE to ensure there would be no shortages for our employees in operations. 

What advice would you give to those who are currently in the same situation?  

1. This is a delicate time for everyone, so it is essential to stay calm so that everyone can continue working together. 
2. We must focus on the business and help everyone do their part.
3. We need to plan the next steps, as I am convinced that at the end of this, we will come out stronger and with renewed certainty.

Image

Quelles leçons avez-vous tirées de cette expérience du confinement ?

Pour rester en contact avec mes collègues, j’ai créé un groupe de réseau social sur Wechat, une appli chinoise de messagerie sociale comme WhatsApp. J’ai invité mes collègues à rejoindre ce groupe pour rester connectés. Grâce à ce réseau, nous avions le sentiment d’être ensemble, réunis. Nous échangions sur des sujets d’ordre professionnel, ainsi que des informations actualisées sur la situation de l’épidémie de Covid-19 dans nos villes.

Comment avez-vous organisé votre temps ?

Cela ne me dérange pas vraiment de travailler depuis chez moi. C’est même mieux parfois. La concentration est meilleure pour accomplir certaines tâches. Il y a moins d’interruptions que lorsque je suis au bureau. C’est plus calme et j’ai le sentiment d’être productive.

Lorsque je travaille à la maison, mon ordinateur portable est toujours allumé, mais, pour me préserver, je prends des pauses régulièrement. C’est pour moi une nécessité. 

Quels conseils donneriez-vous à ceux qui sont actuellement confinés ?

Je leur conseillerais de faire attention à leurs yeux et à leurs vertèbres cervicales [celles du cou] et, si possible, de faire une marche quotidienne. Je fais des exercices de temps en temps grâce à une appli appelée « Keep ». 

Lorsque je prenais une pause, j’écoutais de la musique et je cuisinais pour ma famille. Cela me faisait du bien et m’aidait à garder le moral.

Image

L’Italie est l’un des pays les plus touchés par la crise du Covid-19.
Depuis le début de la crise, la plupart de nos carrières, de nos mines et de nos sites de production continuent de fonctionner.

Notre réponse à cette crise

Dès que la situation a nécessité la déclaration de l’état d’urgence, nous avons formé une équipe d’intervention, composée de gestionnaires de site, de coordinateurs locaux de la santé et de la sécurité environnementale (EHS) à travers le pays, quel que soit le centre ou la zone d’activité dans laquelle ils se trouvaient. Ils étaient tous confrontés aux mêmes problèmes, il fallait travailler ensemble. 

Chaque jour, nous sommes en contact par téléphone à 10 h. Nous le faisons depuis plusieurs semaines et continuerons de le faire tant que nécessaire.

Nous travaillons dans le respect des directives et des restrictions émises par le gouvernement italien, que nous surveillons quotidiennement, en combinaison avec le protocole du Groupe, qui a été développé en interne en réponse à la propagation du virus.

Grâce à l’expérience de nos collègues chinois, nous avons mis à jour nos évaluations des risques biologiques, examiné nos plans de gestion locaux pour garantir la continuité des activités et planifié des stocks d’EPI bien avant l’épidémie. Au moment où le gouvernement a publié des protocoles sur la façon de gérer la production et de garantir la sécurité sur les lieux de travail, nous étions organisés et en conformité.

Au milieu de cette crise sans précédent, j’ai remarqué un excellent engagement et une coopération à tous les niveaux des équipes locales. 

Je voudrais également exprimer une forte reconnaissance à toutes les équipes impliquées ; leur solidarité sur le terrain a été exceptionnelle. Ils se sont tous unis pour faire face à l’adversité.

Quels conseils donneriez-vous à ceux qui travaillent actuellement sur place ?

• Restez en contact avec les autres autant que possible. Assurez-vous de travailler en réseau avec des collègues de votre pays et de partager vos commentaires.
• Sur le lieu de travail, appliquez les règles fixées par le Groupe, conformément à ce que votre gouvernement conseille.
• Soulignez l’importance de l’hygiène quotidienne et de l’assainissement périodique des zones de travail. 

Les sites comptent sur l’engagement de chacun à respecter strictement les procédures pour garantir des lieux de travail sûrs et propres. 

Cela s’applique à tout le personnel, y compris les gestionnaires et les dirigeants. Ça ne peut jamais être trop, surtout si ça sauve des vies !

Image

Comment avez-vous organisé votre temps ?

Je voyage beaucoup pour des raisons professionnelles. Je peux donc dire que je suis entraîné à travailler n’importe où. Mais il me semble bien plus facile de le faire dans un hôtel ou un café que chez soi. 

Au début, j’ai eu quelques difficultés. Mon environnement de travail habituel ayant changé, j’avais du mal à me concentrer ; de plus, j’étais souvent distrait par la consultation quotidienne des messages concernant le Covid-19 sur mon portable.

Quels conseils donneriez-vous à ceux qui sont actuellement confinés ? 

Il n’y a plus de coupure entre le bureau et le domicile de sorte qu’il peut parfois être difficile de séparer vie professionnelle et vie privée — soyez vigilants, cela peut occasionner certaines pathologies mentales.

Nous devons admettre la situation et compter sur les mesures de distanciation sociale comme meilleur moyen de protéger nos collaborateurs et notre entreprise.

Quelles leçons avez-vous tirées de cette expérience du confinement ?

Vous devez faire confiance aux membres de votre équipe et agir avec diligence. Ne vous interrogez pas sur le volume de travail que vos collaborateurs accomplissent à la maison. Vérifiez ce qui a été fait et attribuez en conséquence d’autres tâches aux membres de l’équipe. Contrôlez régulièrement l’avancement du travail et rappelez à vos collègues les délais prévus. 

Donnez des instructions claires. Précisez si une tâche est importante ou urgente. N’envoyez pas de textos ; appelez vos collaborateurs au téléphone et entretenez-vous directement avec eux. 

Continuez à programmer des réunions, mais pas trop. Une réunion une fois par semaine me semble être la fréquence appropriée.

De temps en temps, informez-vous de la situation des membres de l’équipe, encouragez-les et réconfortez-les à chaque fois que c’est possible, car ils sont confrontés aux mêmes difficultés et anxiétés que vous.

Nous pouvons parfois ne pas nous en souvenir, mais nous devons essayer de le faire.

Image

Quels conseils donneriez-vous à ceux qui sont actuellement confinés ? 

Prenez une douche et commencez votre journée de travail exactement comme si vous alliez travailler au bureau. La douche vous met en forme pour affronter la journée. Surtout, enlevez votre pyjama !

Rappelez aux membres de votre famille que vous travaillez à la maison et que vous n’êtes pas en congé. N’oubliez pas de leur dire à quelle heure vous avez une conférence téléphonique, pour qu’ils ne vous dérangent pas. 

Ne travaillez pas dans votre chambre. Ne vous laissez pas tenter par l’idée de vous allonger sur le lit 

Image

Quelles leçons avez-vous tirées de cette expérience du confinement ?

J’ai réalisé qu’il n’est pas toujours nécessaire de travailler au bureau, mais il n’est pas facile de gérer le temps de travail à la maison — cela peut sembler interminable. Faites donc attention à ne pas vous surmener.

Comment avez-vous organisé votre temps ?

Je conserve un accès à ma boîte mail sur le PC de mon domicile, de sorte que je peux travailler chaque fois que je le souhaite. Ayant la possibilité, à la maison, de choisir le moment où je travaille, cela m’aide le plus souvent à mieux me concentrer qu’au bureau.

Lorsque vous êtes en télétravail, dans ces circonstances, loin des distractions et alors que vous êtes peut-être dans l’impossibilité d’accomplir tout ce que vous faites habituellement, vous pouvez effectuer certaines tâches qu’il n’est pas toujours possible de faire au bureau : formation en ligne, ménage de la boîte mail et de la mémoire de votre ordinateur ; ou mise à jour des bases de données, présentations et autres documents.

Quels conseils donneriez-vous à ceux qui sont actuellement confinés ? 

Échangez avec vos collègues en partageant des outils mis à jour et des documents. Recourez à la signature électronique de manière à éviter que les autorisations encombrent le système et à réduire la pile de dossiers entassés sur le bureau à votre retour.

Image

As of 24 March, the majority of India has been under a Government-ordered lockdown; initially the Government indicated it would be for seven days, but it has since been extended.

“In view of the situation in some of our countries of operations and observing the spread of the virus in India, I decided to stop traveling on 17 March, and alerted the plant managers of the coming contagion. With this in mind, we quickly launched business protocol initiatives, allowing us to identify potential gaps several days before India’s lockdown. This in turn enabled us to close the plants very quickly when the lockdown was announced.

In anticipation of the virus, we started screening employees’ temperatures and introduced mandatory hand-washing, with the launch of a “hand-wash break”, signaled by a siren ringing every two hours in each plant. We also set up a hand-washing station at the entrance gate of every plant, so that anyone visiting had to wash their hands before entering, and sanitised regularly the security guards’ base, as a large number of people come through there. 

When the lockdown was announced, the first thing I had to do was to inform all the plant managers of the situation and review with them the steps they needed to take ahead of the closure, which was a major challenge under such short notice. The biggest operational challenge for a business like ours, is that some parts of the equipment can’t be switched off, so we had to properly train employees on call to operate the machinery in our absence.

My biggest challenge was to make sure people understand the severity of Covid-19. As it arrived later in India, I think people didn’t appreciate how serious the situation was. I made sure to share statistics on the virus, notably the spread rate across the world, to get plant managers to circulate the information and ensure employees take the lockdown very seriously. 

We produce carbonate in some of our plants, which we then supply to the paper industry; as both print news and packaging are considered essential sectors, the paper mills have requested permission to resume production, so we are looking forward to reset some of our operations. In the meantime, we are carrying out assessments to see how prepared we are to resume operations, and our teams are conducting their own gap analysis to be as ready as possible for a return to operation.”

What advice would you give to those who are currently working on site?  

1. Communication is key – you need to find effective ways to communicate as quickly and as regularly as possible to ensure employees are not isolated. 
2. Go by the books – we have great business protocols written up and ready to access. 
3. Delegate effectively – ask managers or team leaders to engage with their own team members properly. Coordination is vital and needs to be taken seriously, but you can’t do everything yourself, so you’ll need to ensure your team leaders have everything they need to circulate accurate and relevant information.

Image

 Germany has been under lockdown, with restaurants and most shops closed, since March 22. On April 1^st, the government agreed with regional states to extend the nationwide lockdown aimed at slowing the spread of the coronavirus for another two weeks until April 19. 

“The first indication that we were moving away from business as usual happened early March, when a colleague at our Oberhausen site was suspected to have Covid-19. We immediately tried to figure out which employees had been in close contact with him and sent those identified home as a precautionary measure until our original suspected case had been tested. The results came back negative, but the incident raised awareness among the teams about the virus and highlighted the seriousness of the problem. Because of this, when the situation in Germany developed, our sites were already quite prepared and strategies to tackle the spreading of the virus were underway. 

One of the first things we did was separate shift workers to avoid unnecessary contact between colleagues. We introduced shift handovers, so that people didn’t need to meet face to face, with colleagues documenting relevant information on site for the next shift of workers, and team leaders calling subsequent shift leaders to draw their attention to any outstanding actions. We also separated walkways on each site, to set apart colleagues working the late shift (walking on the right-hand side of the plant) from those working the early shift (walking on the left). On top of this, we placed visual signs highlighting best practice for hygiene across all plants. 

In order to welcome truck drivers  in good safety conditions, we installed mobile toilets, so they didn’t need to share social areas with our full-time colleagues. We also used plastic glass separators to limit accidental contact with bodily fluids.

Each plant has a dedicated crisis team, who everyday monitors the situation in the country and across the world, the volume of positive cases identified, and checks for announcements and updates from the government. We also follow the news of our customers, in connection with our Sales colleagues. At the Business Area level, we have regular meetings to update on best practices and help one another understand what is going on outside our scope, as different locations and areas are facing different problems, like people in workshops, who have to juggle with additional measures, such as incorporating social distancing and wearing dust masks and gloves.”

What advice would you give to those who are currently working on site?  

1. Keep employees connected. Everyone has their own feelings about the Covid-19 outbreak, some are more scared than others. In any case, the immediate future is uncertain, so communicating regularly is super important. That’s why I sent them a letter at home to thank them and reiterate how important they are and that we could not continue operating without them.
2. Be transparent. It is important that employees and relevant stakeholders know why we’re taking the actions we are. 
3. Be extra vigilant. Keep your eyes open for any signs that employees may be struggling, and provide them with the support they need accordingly, whether on site or at home. That’s why I make sure to reiterate the importance of being safe at home, not just at work.

Image

Sao Paulo has been under lockdown, with restaurants and most shops closed, since March 24. On April 7^th, the state of Sao Paulo extended the quarantine by May 10th.

“Since the first Covid-19 cases in Brazil, I have been working continuously, talking to my team very often, to explain the impacts that this situation can have on society as a whole, and on Imerys units. I also made sure to highlight the utmost importance of taking care of one another to overcome this crisis. 

We have implemented control and prevention measures to prevent the spread of the disease, checking the temperature of anyone entering the plant; those with a body temperature of over 37.3ºC are prevented from visiting the site. We also distributed hand sanitizer in strategic places inside the plant (cafeterias, meeting rooms and common areas). We restricted the number of employees in the cafeteria at any one time, where we also changed the way we serve meals, which are now served one by one. Meetings with more than 4 attendees are held outdoors. 

Third party access to the unit is limited, and everyone is advised to wear masks and to greet each other without handshakes, hugs or kisses. All forms of physical contact are minimized. 

For employees with administrative work, we adopted a remote-office system and have put in place the right digital tools to ensure smooth communication. 

What advice would you give to those who are currently in the same situation?  

1. Safety is essential every day, and even more so now. You must make sure that you keep on following the standard rules (use of PPE), and adopt specific recommendations quickly (use of masks, hand sanitizer, less physical contact). 
2. Keep in touch with your team and coworkers; people are concerned, and words of comfort can make a difference and help you remain relaxed and focused. 
3. Be clear, direct and honest with everyone. We are working with people who leave their homes every day to maintain essential productions and “keep the wheel turning!”