Driving the business through lockdown
The circumstances of the past three months have changed things to a greater or lesser degree for all businesses. We count ourselves extremely fortunate to be working in a sector where our services are still required, and our business remains steady. Despite the current global picture, residential developments still need managing agents, so our teams have been continuing to do their jobs managing the developments and providing services to residents and our clients.
At the beginning of lockdown, we had a portfolio of 70,000 residential units under management across the UK. Since then new business enquiries have increased and we have received new instructions on over 2,000 units. It is a relief for our staff and stakeholders to know that we are in a good position.
We’ve also have seen an increase in the number of enquiries for our Right to Manage services in the past quarter. This may be coincidental, but it is possible that because people are spending more time at home since lockdown, they want to have greater control over where they live and so are more interested in bringing in RTM. Some people may have more time to think about these things and opportunity for more regular contact with other leaseholders to make decisions about the management of their building.
In terms of how we operate as a business, we have put in place far reaching safety measures in light of Covid-19 to keep staff and residents safe. Our on-site staff have been continuing to do their jobs managing the developments with the introduction of PPE and much more stringent cleaning procedures.
But in terms of day to day working practices, our 480 head office staff have had to adjust to a bigger change because they have mostly all been working from home. Thanks to our recently upgraded IT systems, that has been really successful, enabling an agile and connected workforce. In fact, we plan to continue to operate a flexible working platform even after we emerge from lockdown, with less focus on returning to the office full time. This more flexible way of working has many real benefits for our employees and the company as a whole in the long term.
There is no doubt these have been unsettling times for everyone but we have learned a lot about the resilience of our staff during this period and if anything, we hope that Rendall & Rittner will be stronger as a result.
