How to mobilise a contract during COVID-19

The hospitality industry is facing difficult challenges. But amongst these there are a few glimmers of light. Through communication and collaboration, we are supporting our clients working in essential infrastructure offices to mobilise their restaurants. We are aiming to bring a sense of normality to customer’s lives.

Mobilising a contract can be challenging at the best of times, so how do we ensure a smooth mobilisation during a pandemic? We asked Anna Clegg, Mobilisation Manager and Gregory Hall, Senior Operations Manager to tell us how they have managed this recently for two different clients.

At the start of the project the Operations team, Project Manager and General Manager create a road map and a mobilisation task list. This is then shared with the key Heads of Department in the onsite catering team.

It’s good to keep contact

It is vital to keep in contact throughout the mobilisation. The initial Zoom meeting outlines the detail, areas of responsibility, actions and timelines. From then on, Zoom meetings continue weekly to ensure we stay on track.

It is crucial we have the client’s approval throughout the process. Presentations where we agree menus, tasters, the scope of services and even the way we present equipment need to be creative and informative. This ensures our client remains reassured and happy at every stage of the process.

Preparing COVID safety measures

As part of our new COVID-19 safe world, we have to ensure our buildings are safe for both our teams and our customers. Occupancy levels are agreed and matched with phasing in different levels of the team at different points of the year.

We liaise with the building architects and fit out teams to agree how planned safety measures will work in the physical environment. These bi-weekly calls are critical to ensure everyone is safe when we go live.

Additional team members are brought back to work from furlough. It’s their job to prepare our current and new building areas ahead of the mobilisation phase. All team members undertake online COVID-19 training. We help them to understand their travel route into work and talk to them on a personal level to make sure they feel as comfortable as possible about returning to work.

The building goes through a deep clean and new COVID-19 safety measures are introduced, ensuring everyone stays safe.

Mobilisation day

When the physical mobilisation weekend arrives, our excitement grows. Dedicated teams made up of a mix of operational support and onsite teams, come together to organise and put everything in place ahead of opening day.

During the mobilisation day, COVID-19 Safe Safety training and Customer Service training is conducted. This ensures that after months of being on the furlough scheme, the team understand how to adapt our approach to what is a nervous time for most.

As a safety measure and part of ensuring our team and customers are safe during these times, we introduced a bm team member Covid-19 policy. This is mandatory for our teams to follow each day. Each team member must declare on our employee app that they have no COVID-19 symptoms, nor does anyone in their household feel sick. They are then required to sign a COVID-19 safety register when arriving at their place of work. By doing this, it has reinforced our approach to safety at work.

Opening day

It’s always great to welcome back our customers both into their current building and into their new location. Seeing their excitement when we welcome them back reminds us why we do it. They can now enjoy the simple things they had missed, our award winning Perkee coffee and a delicious range of dishes! It feels great to receive fantastic feedback from our client team and customers. It’s even better when they tell us how safe they felt whilst receiving such a warm welcome back. The launch of our ‘click and collect’ PearPay App has aided greatly with this. Customers are able to pre-order, pay remotely and collect their food and drink items, all whilst minimising contact. This reinforces the message that their workplace is safe. They can now begin to enjoy the perks that working back in the office gives them.