EXCLUSIVE | Greene King's HRD on pandemic wellbeing

As England dives back into another lockdown and no end appears to be in sight for those working remotely, HR is having to utilise all of its agility to quickly adapt and cater for the needs of employees. And whilst ensuring that business is able to continue is a key priority, for HR, this means allocating much of its bandwidth to the wellbeing of workers.

To discuss the issue of employee wellbeing in the context of COVID-19, HR Grapevine caught up with Andrew Bush, Chief People Officer at the UK’s largest pub retailer and brewer Greene King to find out his thoughts on this process, and how the company has mitigated the pandemic.

HRGV: Do you think HR has been well placed to react to the pandemic? 

Bush: There have been many challenges that HR teams have had to manage during the pandemic, and the furlough process has been one of the bigger ones. We reacted to this by setting up a working group, including expertise across all areas of HR, and met daily to get a temperature check on what our team members were thinking and feeling. This enabled us to create policies, FAQs, and our pay position.