Driving Growth During Uncertain Times

What has kept Emeritus employees motivated at work during the pandemic? My learnings and experiences over the last 15 months.

The pandemic has transformed everyone’s working conditions. Since March 2020, all of us have been impacted directly or indirectly. Even individuals who were blessed with the transition to a 100% work-from-home environment since the start of the pandemic have been challenged in various ways. The pandemic has also impacted all companies, including their P&Ls and business models, like never before. Companies that turned agile and adapted quickly witnessed a higher-than-projected pace of growth. I am lucky to be a part of an organization that is agile and flexible. We are poised to be India’s second-largest EdTech company soon and a leading global player.

For a long time, people have been touted as a company’s biggest asset. This assertion then leads us to certain questions:

●       How can companies support their employees, partners and clients in these uncertain and challenging times?

●       Will those actions help sustain growth in the near term and accelerate it in the post-pandemic world?

Here, I will share a few of my experiences at Emeritus.

Being Human

A humane approach assures all stakeholders of an organization's priorities. A few early signs that indicated my organization's priority towards employees’ and their families’ well-being were:

❖     A shift to work from home was announced early across all globally impacted regions. Later, this was extended first till December 2020 and further until September 2021. In every communication, it was indicated that we would err on the side of caution when it comes to moving back to the office, employee safety being of utmost priority.

❖     Increased physical distancing, however, also increased social connections (through virtual means!). While we were used to scheduled and periodic formal meetings, informal meetings were encouraged early on, which saw teams coming together with no specific agenda regularly. This helped teams connect and disconnect from practical challenges with a few light moments and by helping each other with resources and solutions (everything from managing kids’ schooling requirements to official work).

Leader Connect

I contracted the virus in January 2021. I was truly grateful for the flexibility to disconnect from work and focus fully on recovery (with extra Covid leaves and no work pressure). However, what will never leave me is the number of times the CEO, Business Head (who is also my manager) and other members of the leadership group checked in and offered a word of comfort and even sought advice from their family doctors for me; I will forever be grateful. Such gestures get employees involved as family/partners within the organization. As the impact has significantly increased in the second wave, the founders have scheduled virtual break-out sessions with employee groups in India — these are open freewheeling discussions without any set agenda.

Flexibility in Working Hours

From the outset, employees were encouraged to cater to the health requirements of themselves, their families and their localities as required and catch up with work requirements later. As the second wave has seen increasing infections and casualties at an alarming rate in India, a two-hour slot between 1 pm to 3 pm has been blocked for “No Work, No Internal Calls” until July end. This is to allow time for oneself, families and other personal priorities.

HR Initiatives for Fighting Covid

There were several HR initiatives such as a Covid War Room, emergency hotlines, Connect & Heal (virtual medical and mental wellness support), increased term insurance cover and hospitalization insurance cover, employee assistance fund, salary advance scheme, expert sessions for mental wellness, food & nutrition and personal resilience, and a vaccination camp at our headquarters.

Through these thoughtful initiatives, our people stayed committed to the organization’s mission and current work priorities. Meanwhile, our HR team continued recruiting globally at a pace we have never seen before (Emeritus is now 1000+ strong).

 Flexible Business Strategies

We transitioned all our custom programs being delivered for enterprise clients to 100% online delivery within two weeks of the first lockdown. Programs were designed and delivered with high participant engagement. We are grateful to our clients who trusted us with this shift and to our educators who adapted admirably.

Our educators showed great flexibility in scheduling sessions and even accommodated last-minute cancellations. Educators were innovative in leveraging various options available online to ensure targeted learning outcomes were achieved.

Assignment deadlines were extended for our online courses, which continue to be appreciated by our participants as they navigate through these uncertain times.

All our blended programs (Comprehensive Leadership Programs) in partnership with leading Business Schools had to be paused. Fees were refunded to those who had already paid but preferred not to go ahead with the 100% online versions of the courses or updated schedules. Our operations and finance teams were committed to meeting our partner and client objectives.

 Leveraging Global Strength 

Different geographies have stepped up to support colleagues in regions experiencing more challenging times and ensuring no work disruptions happen for clients.

 Our LATAM team shared this lovely message with our India team recently and we were really touched.

Focusing on the Long Term

I am proud to mention that our organization took an early call to not cut any jobs due to the pandemic. The leadership, however, was mindful of the increasing global uncertainty and possible business impact and made short-term decisions to address the uncertainty while remaining focused on long-term possibilities in making the right decisions. With the support of all the employees, the organization kept its focus on profitable growth while staying committed to its mission.

New Initiatives

New ideas and innovation are always encouraged. We launched several new initiatives/offerings during the pandemic:

1. The Emeritus Insights App
2. Introduction of Senior Executive Online Programs — These are multimodular online programs that grant select alumni benefits from leading Ivy League and global schools.
3. Online Degrees
4. The acquisition of iD Tech and expansion to the K12 space — The leadership team continues to work on strategic priorities and new initiatives that will drive 10X growth and further help our mission of making high-quality education more accessible.
5. An organization-wide Box 3 idea generation competition was initiated to identify and start working on our next growth engine (100+ ideas are being evaluated as we speak).

 As we go through these unprecedented times, I am grateful to be a part of an organization that truly values its employees and to have a wonderful set of colleagues and clients who make work an absolute pleasure. I am glad to be a part of a high-growth organization with excellent values and an excellent leadership team, which has exhibited a growth mindset in one of the most challenging times. Praying for everyone’s health and well-being.