Hartford Business Journal

www.HartfordBusiness.com • October 19, 2020 • Hartford Business Journal 17 sales team continues to work remotely as it did before the pandemic hit. "It has worked great so far, with our entire staff being able to complete their jobs almost identically from home or the office," Kearney said. Hybrid working The majority of small and mid- size companies in Connecticut have reopened their offices in at least split shifts, but there's been more pressure in recent weeks for staff to return, according to Mark Soycher, human resource counsel for the Connecticut Business & Industry Association. Still, though, a rising infection rate and schools opening and closing pe- riodically — forcing parents to care for their children at home — will keep remote working a viable option for many employers. More than half of the 1,000 executives polled this summer by the CBIA and accounting and advisory firm Marcum LLP said their employees had the option to work remotely. "My sense is that employers are looking at productivity, culture, and wanting people back to the office because there's a certain richness of interaction that occurs face to face," Soycher said. Pam Moore, a partner at Hartford law firm McCarter & English, said most companies have a strong desire to reopen to maintain high produc- tivity and also bring back a sense of teamwork that can't easily be repli- cated when workers are fully remote. Most office-based companies are going to limited capacity and using staggered schedules and other meth- ods to keep employees safe, she said. At McCarter & English, for example, employees are split into two teams — half come in on Mondays and Wednesdays, and the other half come in on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Teams then alternative working in the office every other Friday so capac- ity never goes above 50%. Face masks and social dis- tancing are the norm. "I don't have a lot of clients that are 100% remote," said Moore, who rep- resents 50 to 100 clients who each employ between 100 and 50,000 employees. "The nature of almost any organiza- tion is that there has to be some hub of in-person activity and you have to at least have essential personnel in, like your finance or IT people." In terms of legal risks associ- ated with reopen- ing, Moore said as long as employ- ers follow sector safety guidelines published by the state, as well as guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Occupational Safety and Health Administration, then any- one who gets sick at work won't have a claim for negligence. "The only risk is if an employer ignores safety precautions and be- haves recklessly," she said. Setting up a COVID-19-ready office space This diagram from the state Department of Economic and Community Development shows how to set up safe office spaces to prevent the spread of coronavirus. FOCUS: RETURNING TO WORK Pam Moore, Partner, McCarter & English Mark Soycher, Human Resource Counsel, Connecticut Business & Industry Association GRAPHIC | CONTRIBUTED We help guide your business like it is our business. Meet our team at bankatpeoples.com/businessteam Big-time business solutions. That's huge Member FDIC/Member DIF

• Cover