BBS013-1: Foundations of Business Management: COVID-19 Impact on BTR

This report examines the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on Bedford Township Residence (BTR), focusing on challenges related to remote working, communication, and employee motivation. The study identifies key issues such as decreased productivity, difficulties in maintaining team coordination, and employee concerns about health and safety. It also explores the shift in employee attitudes towards work-from-home arrangements and the difficulties in regaining their trust in returning to the office. Recommendations include adopting suitable motivation techniques, improving communication strategies, and implementing strict sanitization protocols to ensure a safe working environment. The report concludes by emphasizing the need for BTR to adapt its practices to address the ongoing challenges and maintain a productive and motivated workforce. Desklib provides this assignment solution and many other resources for students.

Foundations of
Business Management
(BBS013-1)
Assessment 2

Executive Summary
Main purpose of study is to identify impact of COVID-19 over organization. It is
identified that BTR is facing a lot of issues due to ongoing pandemic. These issues are related
with remote working, communication, lack of motivation, attitude of employees and more. There
is suggestions to adopt suitable motivation techniques, communicate with employees regularly
and maintain proper sanitization and cleanliness practices at work place.

Table of Contents
PART 1.......................................................................................................................................................4
Introduction.................................................................................................................................................4
Impact of COVID-19 over organizations.................................................................................................4
Key issues at BTR...................................................................................................................................6
Recommendations...................................................................................................................................8
Conclusion.................................................................................................................................................11
PART 2......................................................................................................................................................11
Reflection..............................................................................................................................................11
References.................................................................................................................................................16

PART 1
Introduction
The ongoing pandemic has devastating impact over business. It is not only affecting the
level of productivity and profitability of organization but also affects the working conditions in
significant manner. With the surge of pandemic, health and safety has become the priority for
companies as well as employees. It is the responsibly of organizations to provide healthy, safe,
clean as well as hygienic environment to employees. This will make employees feel that
company is taking care of the requirements of work force. Main aim of present report is to
identify the impact of COVID-19 over business. Here, impact of pandemic over working
conditions of organization has been identified (Mayer and et. al., 2021). It is identified that
pandemic has been put serious impact over companies in terms of productivity, profitability and
labor availability. In present time, health and safety has become a priority for employees as well
as companies. The present study is based on Bedford Township Residence that is a well-known
organization which offers residence facilities to local people. In report, impact of COVID-19
over working of organization is going to cover. In addition to this, it also includes key issues
which are being faced by company due to impact of pandemic. There are issues related to work
from home, connectivity, communication and more. These all issues will cover in the following
report. Effective recommendations in order to improve the situation are also going to cover in the
study.
Impact of COVID-19 over organizations
It is not easy for an organization to run the operations in the ongoing pandemic situation.
It has changed the entire scenario. Now, people are in panic and highly concern about their
health. With the impact of pandemic, companies also noticed extreme decline in their sales. It
has reduced down the demand of goods as people tend to purchase necessary commodities.
Change in market situation is affecting level of productivity and profitability of organization. In
order to ensure safety, people are likely to avoid to step out from home rather they wish to get all
the necessary services at their own place. Beside this, working environment has also changed
nowadays. Employees consider their safety as the first priority thus they wish to do work from

home rather going office. They are in panic and want to avoid socializing. In COVID-19 remote
work has gained popularity. Companies have been modified their working mechanism as per the
WFH model. By this way, they can contribute in controlling the transmission of virus. In
addition to this, employees are also likely to feel safe while working from home (Mckinsey &
Company, 2021).
It is found that labor market is highly affected with COVID-19. Companies are working
on cost –cutting model. As a result, a lot of people have lost their job or shifted in work from
home practices as offices are closed. Apart from this, it also changed the mind-set of individuals.
Now, Most of the people seek for work from home opportunity so that they can spend more and
more time with their families in this uncertain situation. Prior pandemic, companies used to
encourage employees to take part in meetings, workshops and other such activities. They
emphasis over communication in order to minimize ambiguity at work place. Due to pandemic,
companies are following WFH practices so that physical interaction can be avoided. Apart from
this, entities are required to follow the guidelines and protocols of COVID-19 that has been
structured by government of respective countries. They are required to design work practices in
such a manner that people do not require to personally interact with each other. With the impact
of pandemic, technology has become an essential factor for each and every company. In this
context, organization opt advance ways so that they can avoid personal contact at work place.
Additionally, meetings are now arranged through cloud computing apps such as Zoom,
Microsoft team and more (Steve Harris, 2020)..
In current scenario, health has become the first priority that is the reason that employee
demand for work from home. Companies are also conscious about cleanliness, hygiene and
sanitization. There is emphasis on maintaining clean, hygienic environment in order to ensure
safety of work force. It is mandate for employees to get the routine checkup done and companies
also allow to them to get home isolated if they are not feeling well. In addition to this,
organizations need to spend huge amount while following the COVID protocols. There is great
uncertainty is prevailing in labor market due to the impact of pandemic. Individuals has prepared
their mind set about doing work from home. There is panic among people about re-joining of
office (Gould, 2020). On the other side, companies are also facing issues in order to make timely
payment to work force. In reference of BTR, their practices are highly affected with COVID-19.

They have been shifted a lot of employees in work from home practices. Here, main concern of
organization is to ensure safety of staff members. Due to this, issues related to communication
and connectivity arises at work place.
With the impact of COVID-19, work practices has been shifted in online mode. It
reduced down the opportunities of personal interaction, connectivity among work force.
However, meetings are being taken through cloud computing apps but all the employees were
not able to connect at the same time. Some employees were facing issues related to connectivity.
In addition to this, employees also developed careless attitude during remote work. It directly
affected their productivity (Miller, 2021). In BTR, directors took decision of WFH by
considering safety and security of work force. Due to the impact of COVID-19, companies face
hardship in managing proper communication as well as interaction between different
departments. For the purpose of virtual meeting, BTR improved their technical infrastructure so
that all the employees can interact with each-other in an effective manner. Therefore, COVID-19
put profound impact over the working practices of company. They need to make modifications in
their current approaches in order to adjust with current environment.
Key issues at BTR
During COVID-19, majority of employees were working from home. It is found that
situation in WFH is entirely different from WFO. It is possible to give time to family, friends
during work from home. Apart from this, employees can also extract time for their own hobbies.
They can also learn new skills, knowledge along with the office work. On the top of that, they
have feasibility to do the work from wherever they want. They can easily choose the place as per
their own convenience and desire (Boersma and Wolbers, 2021). In addition to this, WFH
provide opportunity to maintain proper balance between personal and professional life.
Employees of BTR started to feel comfortable in WFH. Hence, it is difficult for company to
change the mind set of staff members and call them back in office premises. As employees are
working from home for longer duration thus this sudden switch will not easy for them.
It is found that employees of BTR are highly concern about their health, safety at work
place. In office, meetings are the essential part of daily activities. It is quiet touch to avoid
physical interaction, personal meets and socialization in office premises (Wrycza and
Maślankowski, 2020). In this regard, BTR need to ensure that all the protocols of COVID-19 are

followed strictly. They need to ensure that all the employees are fully vaccinated. Apart from
this, there is requirement to arrange the meetings by following the guidelines of social
distancing. However, it does not seem easy to follow all the guidelines in prescribed manner. It is
the human tendency that they cannot avoid personal contact and touch while working together.
Hence, BTR is going to face tremendous issue related to following the guidelines and protocols
properly.
Remote working is also a major issue for respective company. During WFH, it is not easy
to maintain proper communication among team members. Sometimes, employees are not able to
coordinate with each other. It might occur sever issues at work place. Here, company was also
facing issues in maintaining proper coordination between different departments (Sharfuddin,
2020).
As the situation is moving towards normalcy, BTR is opening the office premises thus
employees need to re-join the office. Here, employees are worried about health. They are scared
about transmission of virus that can be easily transmit from one person to another. Returning
office again will not easy task for employees. Fear of health, security is increasing the stress
level of employees. Due to this, they are not able to cope up with change in environment. It is
also affecting level of productivity of staff members (Naor and et. al., 2021). Additionally,
employees are facing issues related to mental health thus they are not able to fully concentrate on
the work. Hence, BTR is facing issues related to productivity and efficiency of employees at
work place.
The other issue is pertaining to motivation level of work force. Pandemic has been put
devastating impact over mental as well as physical health of people. In case of BTR, several
employees have been shared the problem that they are going through with major mental issues. It
is destroying their motivation level. They are unable to interact with customers properly. In
addition to this, they always remain in panic of getting affected with virus. Reason being, staff
members are not able to concentrate on work properly (Basu and Ferreira, 2021). In addition to
this, there is lack of customers visit in outlets. Employees need to interact with customers either
or calls. Lack of interaction with customers is also enhancing the frustration level of employees
in significant manner.

In BTR, there is issue of employee motivation. Lack of motivation is affecting
productivity of work force in adverse manner. They are not able to work with their maximum
level of efficiency. For completion of work in proper manner, willingness of work force is really
important. Without willingness the work become hectic and employees also do not put their best
for organizational success. In context of BTR, lack of motivation has become a crucial issue
which is affecting the level of profitability of organization.
Work from home practices has brought tremendous change in perception of employees.
Now, they have concern about health and safety. Due to this reason, employees are not in favor
of resuming work from office again. Rather, they are more comfortable with WFH as they can
avoid the personal contact thus transmission of Virus by working from home. In this situation, to
make employees believe that company will follow all the necessary protocols is not easy. Here,
gaining trust of work force is challenging task. Apart from this, company will also face
difficulties in developing positive attitude among work force regarding work from office
practices (Kates, Gerolamo and Pogorzelska‐Maziarz, 2021).
Recommendations
After going through with the above stated information, it is analyzed that there are several
issues that are being faced by BTR and affecting its operations in profound manner. However,
BTR is a well known residence company but there is requirement to make some enhancement in
current practices of organization. These practices will help in order to address the issues of
company in appropriate way. For this purpose, certain recommendations are state below:
 It is found that BTR faced several issues of communication and connectivity while
majority of its employees were working from home. It is analyzed that employees have
lack of coordination so that they were not able to understand the perception of each other
in proper way. In order to address this issue, BTR is suggested to arrange suitable
meetings and workshops wherein employees of different department can easily interact
with each other. This will improve the corporation and coordination among team
members so that they can easily do their work from any place.
 Employees are highly scared on resuming work from office again. They have fear about
their safety and security at work place. It is recommended that BTR needs to follow the
proper guidelines of cleanliness and hygiene in order to ensure safety of employees

within organization. They also need to follow the protocols related to social distancing,
screening of employees and more. Apart from this, they need to arrange sanitization
practices at workplace in timely manner. By following these practices, it is possible to
provide such an environment to employees where they can work without any concern
related to health (Eikhof, 2020).
 In panoramic situation, employees did work from home for a longer period of time. It is
quite difficult for them to suddenly switch from work from home to work from office
model. Due to this, some employees of BTR are getting highly frustrated and
demotivated. In this context, company is required to undertake honest and fair
conversation with employees. With this, they get to know about the perspective of
employees regarding pre and post COVID situation. This conversation will strengthen the
bond of managers and employees at work place. It will make managers enable to
structure proper policies & strategies in order to get the work done in proper way.
 It is analyzed that work force of BTR is losing motivation to work. They are highly
conscious about health and safety thus not able to properly concentrate on assigned tasks.
In addition to this, change environment from work from home to work from office is also
a frustrating factor for employees. In order to meet this issue, administration of BTR is
required to adopt suitable motivational techniques so that they can develop willingness
among employees to work. Here, managers are required to offer rewards,
acknowledgement as well as monetary benefits such as incentives, bonus to employees. It
will improve their satisfaction level and will help company in getting positive outcomes.
 It is suggested that BTR needs to follow hybrid model so that employees can
alternatively do work from home and office. It will allow company to make maximum
utilization of potential of employees. On other side, employees can also maintain proper
balance in their personal and professional life by following the hybrid model. In addition
to this, It will reduce down the additional and overhead cost of BTR as they do not need
to spend on large office space and other requirements.
 In order to manage the project successfully, it is suggested to BTR to prepare Gantt chart. It
will provide information regarding different activities along with the deadlines. It will help to
know how the project can be accomplished by following all the necessary activities as per
pre-define schedule. It is a vital tool of project management that minimizes the complexity

level of project. It helps in identifying role and responsibilities of different team members in
order to complete the project in successful manner.
The above stated recommendations are based on actual situation present in BTR. Here,
they can motivate, inspire employees by maintaining proper communication with them.
Additionally, they can deal with fear of employees by arranging cleanliness and sanitization
practices at work place. Effective implementation of these recommendations will help entity in
addressing all the major issues in an effective manner.

Conclusion
It is concluded from above discussion that COVID-19 has been put a serious impact over
business. Apart from influencing daily operations, profitability, it also affected working
environment of company. It is concluded that BTR is facing tremendous issues of changing
attitude of employees, lack of motivation, lack of connectivity and more due to the impact of
COVID-19 over organization. In order to address the issues, company is required to maintain
proper communication, clean environment and needs to follow hybrid model wherein employees
can balance between work from home and office.
PART 2
Reflection
During the module, I learned ample of skills which are going to help me in growth of
career in future period of time. Here, I got the opportunity to solve the business case which
helped me in developing different competencies for future betterment. During sessions, I got
opportunity to analyze my present caliber so that I can identify the areas in which I am lacking.
Certain skills developed through the module are outlined below:
Communication Skills: While studying in the course, I developed communication skills.
I developed oral as well as written communication skills by taking part in presentation, class-
room activities and report writing sessions. During weekly lectures, communication skills were
developed by taking part in different activities. This skill will help me in order to perform
interact with other people in an impressive way. This is e
Numeracy Skills: Learning session during module allowed me to enhance my
capabilities of performing numeric analysis. During the session, I got knowledge of statistics,
numerical tools and tools of financial management. I got exposure of financial tools that will
help in analyzing the data and information in an efficient manner. While working on BTR case
study, I got opportunity to prepare balance score card which enhanced my ability to analyze the
data and information.

Data information and knowledge: While studying in the module, I got knowledge of
MS office tools. With the inferences received through the session, I am able to prepare well-
structured and systematic report in MS word. In addition to this, I am also capable to prepare
appropriate reports and data sheets using MS-Excel. This is a professional skill which will help
me in performing assigned work in an efficient manner at work place. This is related with Belbin
model. Here, I can perform my role in professional way. This skill will allow me to significantly
contribute in success of team. With this, I can grab the opportunity of future success. It will
allow me to explore my skill-set in professional environment.
Problem solving skills: It is the skill which is related with solving the issue in business
scenario. This is a crucial skill which allows an individual to give meaningful suggestions in
order to resolve the issues that are being faced by an organization. I was not good enough in
problem solving skills and my tutor of respective module was well familiar with the fact.
However, I gain the knowledge and took inferences from the lecture material. Somehow I
managed to develop the respective skill. Working on the BTR case study was the biggest
opportunity for me to develop problem solving skills. Here, I studied the case study and
developed suitable recommendations as per scenario. This skill is relevant with Kolb model
where I can apply my personal experience, skills and expertise in order to solve the business
issues that are being faced by company. With the wide knowledge and information gained during
the module I am able to improve respective skill.
Human resource management: I got the learning related to human resource
management. During this week, I learned that the mistakes which are often made by a candidate
while preparing CV. With this, I get to know how to write the CV in proper way by including
different sections such as Objectives, Accomplishments and more.
Entrepreneurship: This skill is related with development of new products and services.
I learned about significance of entrepreneurship. I also learned about the barriers which might
face by a person while starting a new venture. This skill is crucial in current and will help those
students who wish to start their own business in future period of time. The session of this week
was really insightful and helped students in order to get knowledge regarding entrepreneurial
activities.