Regardless of industry, businesses that are allowed to stay open are trying to find new and creative solutions to keep operations rolling during a global crisis. Undoubtedly, these decisions are hard to come by, since new information is constantly being released and data seems to fluctuate rapidly.
Fortunately, there are educational councils who make it their business to carefully define best practice ideas for particular industries. In the warehousing industry, we have WERC, which stands for the Warehousing Education and Research Council. They recently unleashed their best practices recommendations for warehouses during these unique times. We’ve already covered some of the things here and here regarding what warehouses can do to combat the spread of the coronavirus. In this post, we’ll highlight, per WERC recommendations, the things you should discuss during risk management conference calls/zoom sessions/teams sessions etc.
Things to Consider With Your Risk Management Plan
Perhaps the most important thing you should be doing is reaching out to your customers; after all, what is any business without customer/client base? Find out how the pandemic is affecting their businesses, what concerns they have and be honest with how the pandemic is affecting your warehouse’s ability to fulfill orders.
Of course, if customers are “1A” on your list, then suppliers are “1B.” Similar to dealing with customer relations, you’ll want to find out how the pandemic has disrupted things, if at all, for your suppliers, and figure out what you can do to tailor your services to help them.
Next, you’ll want to figure out how logistics has been affected by the pandemic to ensure pickup and deliveries continue to efficiently be completed. Internally, you should have a plan in place should things start to affect employees—meaning what will you do if things slow down? What will you do, hiring wise, if things pick up? And in the nightmare scenario, what are you going to do if an employee unfortunately tests positive for COVID-19?
If you need help with your warehousing and distribution needs, learn how Affiliated Warehouse Companies can help.
