How are you and how is Uhlmann China dealing with the COVID-19 situ­a­tion?

Jochen Scheil: Uhlmann China is oper­ating on “work from home / reduced office atten­dance” mode since Feb 10. I myself stayed in Germany since end of January with my family on a private trip and due to the devel­op­ments in China at that time we have decided to stay in Germany for the time being instead of returning back mid February. My staff also had diffi­cul­ties in returning back to Shanghai/Beijing after the New Year holi­days, but now are all back to their homes and working from there, respec­tively go to office upon prior approval and only if neces­sary as per work plan which is reviewed weekly by the Manage­ment Team.

We in China are used to work using “digital tools” such as WeChat (similar to What­sApp) to orga­nize our work and to easily commu­ni­cate with colleagues and even our customers. Hence when imple­menting “home office” work scheme it was not diffi­cult for us to inte­grate this into our daily routine. The only thing we some­times miss is having a small talk with office mates over coffee/tea while in office and our “real” face-time with staff and customers. All staff and our customers appre­ciate our efforts in keeping busi­ness ongoing as best as possible during these diffi­cult times and fully support the measures taken by the company as well as the measures imple­mented by the local commu­ni­ties (temper­a­ture checks, moni­toring of where­abouts, limi­ta­tion of social contacts, etc.)

What measures did you imple­ment and since when?

JS: The Chinese New Year holi­days had been extended by another 1 week. We orig­i­nally planned to go back to work on Feb 1. However due to the devel­op­ments over in China the govern­ment had decided to extend the public holi­days until Feb 9, hence we should resume work starting Monday, Feb 10. However due to the severe devel­op­ments the govern­ment encour­aged to imple­ment different work schemes such as work from home, stag­gered work in office (less staff at the same time in office), etc. Uhlmann China has imple­mented “home office” scheme since then and the Manage­ment Team is reviewing the work plan for stag­gered work in office (who is in office and when) on a weekly basis.

Besides we are using calls, email, WeChat, MS-Teams (which is an excel­lent tool to commu­ni­cate and to share docu­ments )to stay in touch with each other and with our customers. The customers also slowly start oper­a­tions after extended holi­days and a 14 days self-quar­an­tine for their staff who trav­elled within China during Chinese New Year and now returning to their work places. On a personal level UCN has provided hand sani­tizer in our office and even provided suffi­cient medial masks for all our staffs to ensure personal safety.

What is expe­ri­ence on working from home, reduced time in office, travel restric­tions, etc.?

JS: We only made posi­tive expe­ri­ence on working from home and we thank the Uhlmann IT in Germany in providing remote access for those staff who usually are working office and who now needs to remotely work from home. Our staff appre­ci­ates the efforts made by our company in allowing such work model. For those we need to be in office to handle e.g. accounting/finance, spare parts ship­ment, etc. a specific work plan has been arranged by the UCN Manage­ment Team so that the personal safety of staff is ensured consid­ering the rules & regu­la­tions set by the Office Manage­ment where UCN is holding offices in Shanghai and Beijing.

Travel restric­tions within China/Overseas remain in place and will be adjusted if needed as per latest advice by local author­i­ties. Our local Customer Support Team mean­while has success­fully completed installation/SAT at one of our customers in Shanghai as travel restric­tions for German tech­ni­cians are still in place. This clearly shows that our local for local approach is working fine even in chal­lenging times. The remote support of our HQ in Laupheim during this installation/SAT was great and I thank everyone for their hard work to make this SAT a successful one.

What is your recom­men­da­tion to other colleagues/staff in our HQ who might need to deal with such new circum­stances (home office, etc.)?

JS: Adopt and embrace such new work schemes as they will help everyone to keep safe and keep busi­ness ongoing during these chal­lenging times. Make proper use of the commu­ni­ca­tion tools provided to allow such “remote” work and setup a routine commu­ni­ca­tion with your team/staff. This will greatly help until the situ­a­tion will become normal again. Besides such new work schemes might become the future work schemes hence you are able to try it out already now. I am sure you will only make posi­tive expe­ri­ences while using those.