ServiceNow’s new Safe Workplace applications are available now to help organizations prepare their workforce and workplace to resume operations after emergencies and pandemics like COVID-19. Building on the same user-friendly architecture and automations that are a hallmark of any ServiceNow solution, the apps bring consistency and structure to how businesses manage and plan during this critical time. Installation is done through the System Applications module or the ServiceNow store, and each application has configuration options, similar to the Emergency applications released in March.
Read on to learn more about ServiceNow’s Safe Workplace apps and how they can help offices and businesses re-open safely:
Survey employees to gauge their attitudes about returning to work. This is a survey application that is used in coordination with the Emergency Outreach application to send a survey via outreach notifications. This app comes preloaded with survey questions, but the check-in administrator for Emergency Outreach can view and edit survey questions to fit your organization's needs. Like all surveys, there is a survey score card to see survey responses. Even the notifications can be configured to have the appropriate messaging, look and feel like other notifications in the system.
Default survey questions include:
- We're asking everyone about any recent travel. Have you traveled within the past month?
- Please tell us where you traveled.
- Please select the statement that describes your health status. For info about symptoms, see www.cdc.gov.
- How do you feel about a possible return to your workplace?
- Please select the statement that applies to you.
- How would you feel if we provided protective supplies, such as masks, gloves, and hand sanitizer, at your workplace?
- How would you feel if we allowed flexible work arrangements? For example, you work on-site only certain days or hours of the week, or have a different shift.
- Add any comments or concerns you wish to share.
This app can be used in conjunction with the other ServiceNow Safe Workplace applications.
Keep track of health screening data for every employee. As businesses implement mandatory body temperature screenings and/or require employees to self-report any illness symptoms, ServiceNow’s Employee Health Screening app provides a comprehensive way to manage and analyze this employee health data. Employees are screened, results are recorded, and individuals can be admitted or denied entrance based on the results.
Administrators can also view trends via the reporting dashboard and track the return of employees into their facilities over time.
Optimize the configuration and density of workspaces. With social distancing likely to remain a workplace norm until a COVID-19 vaccine is developed, businesses are under pressure to ensure employees can keep a safe distance away from one another while at work. ServiceNow’s Workplace Safety Management app makes it easy for businesses to establish distancing plans, shift assignments, and sanitation scheduling and manage workspace allocation in stages.
Space Administration - Optimize the configuration and density of workspaces (workstations, conference rooms, and cafeterias across a building or campus, for example) using detailed location data that can be easily imported from a spreadsheet. Manage details such as what group or person manages the space, active/inactive status, and whether or not it is reservable.
Shift Management – Associate a workspace to a shift, and then assign employees to a shift. Workplace tasks can be managed, assigned and tracked so that pre- and post-cleaning can be done for spaces before a shift starts and after a shift ends. View occupancy, reservations, scheduled cleaning tasks and ad hoc cleaning tasks via a dashboard
Manage your PPE inventory to ensure every employee has access. During the earliest days of the COVID-19 pandemic, many front-line health care workers struggled to get access to adequate supplies of personal protective equipment (PPE). ServiceNow’s new Workplace PPE Inventory Management app is expressly designed to monitor and track PPE availability and fulfill requests for PPE; it can even be configured with stocking rules to automatically resupply stockrooms. And from a centralized dashboard, a business can gain a snapshot overview of what PPE inventory has been consumed, what remains in stock, what’s been ordered, in transit, in use, or missing.
The data model is for PPE is similar to Hardware and Software Asset Management: there is a model for each type of PPE in inventory, which can be published to the Service Catalog. Stock can then be tracked for different locations in stockrooms. Stocking rules can be setup to automatically resupply stockrooms, and PPE can be assigned to employees without a request.
As employees return to the workplace, organizations are responsible for ensuring that their returning employees are safe and feel supported. ServiceNow’s four new Safe Workplace apps are here to help businesses rise to the occasion. These apps were expressly designed to help businesses keep a pulse on employees’ attitudes and feelings about returning to work, keep track of employee health screening data, optimize the configuration and density of workspaces, and manage PPE inventory in the workplace.
For guidance on how to implement or use the Safe Workplace apps, or if you have questions, please contact the ServiceNow implementation specialists at Crossfuze: LetsTalk@crossfuze.com. We understand best-practices configurations for ServiceNow’s entire lineup of enterprise applications, and can show how to optimally use ServiceNow technology to make your post-COVID-19 reopening a successful, affirming experience.