Office Facilities Management Checklist - Are you ready to return to work?
Updated: Feb 18
Is your front of house exposed?
Post pandemic, the workplace will not be the same. One outcome of the pandemic is that it has accelerated changes that were creeping along the adoption curve, however, many business are sleepwalking into a very risky return to the office. Due to COVID, businesses now must be more aware of their workplace safety, reception efficiency, productivity and visitor experience - to avoid many organisational risks.
NHS England have provided a useful set of recommendations for organisations planning to reopen their offices that are relevant to your reception space. These include:
Conducting the compulsory HSE COVID working environment risk assessment
Ensuring adequate social distancing is in place
Re-deploying staff to lower risk areas (e.g. in a back office rather than at a reception desk)
More frequent cleaning of all areas
Ensuring PPE government guidelines are adhered to
Types of Risks In Facilities Management
Facilities Managers must be aware of the types of risks that the pandemic has created, and in turn consider:
Not relying on manual processes to get right
Not burdening your front of house team unnecessarily
Not keeping you or your Legal team awake
Not going to ensure you have a very rocky return to work post Easter
Below you'll find a simple facilities management checklist of risks I think it would be wise to ensure are considered, with mitigations in place as you start to bring workers back to the office.
Office Facilities Management Checklist
Use this office facilities management checklist in your return to office planning a Vgreet digital visitor management kiosk help you reduce or remove these challenges. We list down types of risks in facilities management to return to work. Some of these items will need the support of other departments, such as Legal, Finance, HR or IT.
1. Compliance Risks
GDPR risks - ensuring existing visitor management systems are fully GDPR compliant
You set your visitor data automatic purging to ensure compliance
Regular visitors opt in to facial recognition
Fines - social distancing, PPE and other COVID enforcements
Health and safety enforcement orders and spot checks
NHS Track and Trace self-isolation(encouraging an employee to come into the workplace and not self-isolate means an employer can be fined over £1000)
Remove the risk by using digital visitor management
Read more about Vgreet's GDPR Compliance feature.
2. Risk Assessments
Visitor data security
Auto purge visitor data after X days
Congested reception contamination risk
'COVID-Safe' workplace risk assessment
Health and safety executive risk assessment
Review existing risk assessmentsif changing office layout/furniture to allow for social distancing, to minimise hazards around the workplace
Remove by adding Vgreet capacity
Read more about risk assessments.
3. Technical Risk
Visitor blacklist management
GDPR
Auto delete visitor emails so you do not have GDPR issues, standard within Vgreet
4. Employee Risk
Visitor Self Health checks
Customise your pre-registration invite
Visitor Track and Trace
Track visitors in the building on days when "now isolating staff were in"
Visitor reception processes (touchless)
Visitor reception contamination through congested receptions
Ensure Touchless express 3 second check-in with a Vgreet Visitor Management Kiosk
Remove the whole risk of a congested reception by adding rapid check-in Vgreet Kiosks with the capacity to check-in 2,500 visitors a day!
5. Reputational Risk
Avoid relying on tape, screens and signs
Avoid Turning the reception into an emergency zone
Avoid creating the opposite of psychological safety for your returning employees
Whistle blower risk; you're the one the tabloids will get a photo of, in your reception with staff or visitors queuing.
A simple set of useful calculators are below:
It takes 20-30 minutes to carry out a simple digital assessment and see where your tailored gains are, risks you can eliminate, visitor experience gains, Book your risk & experience health check here.
Download our office facilities management checklist template here - facilities management checklist pdf
Read our ultimate guidelines of visitor management systems
Want to find out more about how we can help facilities managers? Contact us