Role of HR to combat Swine Flu

Its just been a few days since we’ve started hearing about the outbreak of swine flu, a modern day disease not heard of before and mainly having been confined to pigs. Though it is still limited to certain parts of the world like Mexico, USA, UK while Asia-Pacific being safe as of now organizations all over the world should gear themselves to help in preventing the spread further. This can be done in many ways with the help of the HR dept. by means like-

• First & foremost educating the company staff about the how, what, why of the disease to prevent spread of rumours & advise all to seek medical help at the earliest incase any similiar symptoms are detected.
• Already cancelling or postponing official trips to swine flu affected countries
• Identifying employees who have a wide range of skills to fulfil a variety of functions incase the headcount has to be cut down due to a massive outbreak
• Skeleton staff level strategies should be planned well in advance
• Work from home options ahould be maximised to avoid employees getting in contact with each other.
• The Service sector industry should specifically concentrate on self service options for its customers or possibly have more online transactions as compared to face-to-face ones
• Videoconferencing or teleconferencing should be used to allow meetings to still take place

So, basically Human Resources should be used by means of a contingency plan which allows maximum contact in every possible way except face-to-face; a lot being made possible by use of technology