During the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, our news feeds and social media channels are filled with stories about job losses, businesses closing and people struggling to make ends meet.
But it’s not all doom and gloom; our colleagues at Alcumus have all pulled together as one team to put on a united front against the challenges we are all facing with some inspiring stories of those going above and beyond to help each other.
Here is just one of those stories…
Starting a new role during a global pandemic:
When John Elliott (Software Developer) first came in to interview for a role with Alcumus, no one really had an idea of the extent to which the country would begin to shut down over the coming weeks/months. The interview process was relatively normal with only a passing comment about it not being advisable to shake hands and an offer was made; All was well.
Fast forward to only 10 days later and John joined the business in our last face to face induction in our Cardiff HQ, welcomed by our Learning Experience Consultant, Amelia’s friendly face. At that time, precautions had ramped up; there was lots of handwashing and sanitiser use with people avoiding any form of physical contact. Desks were arranged at least a meter apart and yet everyone was still made to feel at ease.
As the two-day induction came to a close, news quickly broke that the following day was to be 100% working from home for the entire business following government advice. Ben Palmer (Software Developer) took the lead in John’s onboarding plan and worked quickly to ensure that John had everything he would need to get himself set up, despite a hiccup along the way with the suppliers not delivering his laptop in time.
Utilising Teams as a communication channel, John’s training and introduction to the systems was successfully commenced and John has nothing but positive things to say about the situation and how it has been handled by the team and wider business. He’s even boasting a success of getting camera shy Ben to turn his video on during calls!
A huge thank you to all involved for displaying the Alcumus value of ‘Be a team player’.
Together we achieve more.