The Power of Mobile Apps to Inspire Confidence in a Safe Return to the Workplace and Campus

As companies and schools prepare to welcome employees and students back to the office and campus, they recognize the need to make them feel connected, informed, and safe. While every parent wants to know their student is safe on campus, we’ve also seen a growing trend around safety and wellness in the workplace. Both schools and businesses know that people are more engaged and productive when they are healthy and able to focus on the task at hand.

Minimize fears to boost productivity
In today’s world, a return to the office and campus comes with new concerns and stress. Alleviating apprehensions and anxiety should be the priority for every company and school.

The reality is that some percentage of employees and students will pick up where they left off as if nothing happened. Others will be feeling trepidation about being in close proximity to larger groups of people. Every company and school will need to find ways to keep all employees and students feeling productive and safe.

Share timely information
Doing so effectively means ensuring that everyone understands and complies with new guidelines and protocols – even as those change. Unfortunately, it can take hours and even days to publish new information on a website. Plus, not everyone consults websites on a regular basis. Emails aren’t that much more effective for essential communications. People read them at different times. In fact, according to research by ZipStripe, the average response time for an email is six hours. The same study found that people open push notifications within 15 minutes on average.

With this in mind, it’s logical to consider mobile apps a key communication tool. Considering that nearly everyone has a mobile device and checks it frequently, a mobile app is an extremely effective way to share timely information. In addition, companies and schools can use an app to provide easy access to critical resources, and adjust quickly to continually changing circumstances.

Localize the experience
Just as important, companies and schools can use a mobile app to deliver a localized experience, showing information tailored to their physical office or campus location. In this way, companies and schools can ensure returning employees and students receive only relevant information and guidance – and are empowered and prepared for anything.

For example, through a mobile app, it’s easy to provide access to helpful phone numbers to contact safety personnel, and up-to-date local protocols, policies and guidelines. A company could send notifications as an employee arrives to the office alerting them to changes in cafeteria hours and sanitizing workstation policies. A school’s app could show information about eating options and other onsite amenities and, as a student enters the cafeteria, remind them about the social distancing protocol.

The mobile app can show building and floor plans so employees and students can easily locate wellness centers, temperature-taking stations, and PPE. The app could even display real-time floor and building capacity alerts so people know when they should avoid a certain area.

Through quick polls and notifications, companies and schools can get an idea of whether people are social distancing and frequently washing their hands. They can then send out push notifications to nudge and drive these important behaviors.

These localized, real-time capabilities inspire confidence and trust that employees and students are following protocols and guidelines – and that companies and schools are doing all they can to keep everyone safe.

The app is the new workplace and campus
A mobile app is perfectly suited to deliver information and resources to anyone anywhere. As such, it is the perfect tool for organizations serving a range of people, whether everyone is onsite, remote, or some are onsite and others remote. In other words, the mobile app is the workplace and campus in the new normal.

In fact, many organizations are harnessing a mobile app to build their culture and inspire their people. Consider the case of Huntington Hospital in Pasadena California. Even before the coronavirus, the hospital was challenged to effectively communicate with a broad, diverse staff with very divergent work hours. Those challenges increased with new safety precautions such as working remotely and social distancing.

Huntington Hospital takes advantage of their mobile app built on the Modo platform to overcome those issues. They feature a COVID-19 information center and a Getting Through Things Together module on their app’s home screen to keep their entire staff of frontline workers connected and informed. The hospital also sends push notifications through the app to highlight important events or announcements.

Bring people back with confidence
As companies and schools make plans for a return to their physical locations, it’s critical to call upon the right technology to enable this transition. Mobile is an effective tool to safely and confidently bring people back to the workplace and campus. A mobile app enables efficient and timely communications and resource access, whether people are in the office, on campus, or at home. In this way, it is a reliable companion resource that companies and schools can rely upon for years to come. Not only does a mobile app empower organizations to support their workforces and students, it gives them a tool to help curb the spread of the coronavirus.

Learn how the no-code Modo platform enables companies and schools to quickly and affordably build and deploy an app that serves their needs today and in the future.