How do you enable social distancing and keep your employees safe in a workplace designed to bring them together? Due to the pandemic companies with an open workspace model faced the challenge of temporarily having to close facilities and, if feasible, ask employees to work from home. Carglass was looking for a solution to keep their offices open while effectively protecting their employees from Covid-19. novaCapta provided a solution, which is based on Microsoft 365, Power Automate and Dynamics 365 Customer Voice.
Scan, book, start your work day
The Carglass® workstation booking system
Challenge
Increased risk of infection with the coronavirus in the open space office
Search for a solution for further use of the open space model with maximum possible protection of the employees' health as well as digital tracing of possible infection chains.
In order to avoid end device binding and necessary installation, request for a native solution without app
Solution
Digital on-site booking system for workstations in the open space office based on Microsoft SharePoint, Power Automate and Dynamics 365 Customer Voice
Flexible control (activation and deactivation) of available workstations
Additional features such as automatic logout for temporary locations like the canteen
Benefit
Maintaining operations in the open space office during the Corona pandemic
Web app works without installation, the QR code can be scanned with the business cell phone as well as with the private device
Infection chains can be traced via the registered entries, who sat at which workplace, when and for how long, and necessary measures can be derived from this, such as reporting to the health office
The app was very well received by the employees and we have the possibility to customize and even develop it further if needed.
Carglass® uses QR code bookings to ensure a safe working environment in the office
Carglass offers its employees modern open workspace offices to provide an innovative workplace and encourage collaboration between employees and across teams. Within this structure, employees choose a new workplace every day. Due to the pandemic, an urgent need to reconsider the open workspace model emerged, to prevent and minimize health risks. As well as new occupational health and safety measures set by the government, such as minimum distances between individual workstations, had to be adapted. Carglass was faced with the prospect of having to close its offices temporarily and may ask employees to work from home.
The company was looking for a solution that would give their employees both options: working in the office or from home. But how do you manage to maintain a safe social distance (= six feet distance between employees) in an open workspace environment? "We had been searching intensively for a suitable solution, but at that time the market did not offer anything for us," Periklis Stavrinos, Product Owner Digital Workplace at Carglass, recalls the situation at the time.
Requirements for on-site booking system
In order to be able to maintain the required minimum distance, a system was needed with which the number of workstations in the open space offices could be flexibly activated and deactivated. To keep track of possible infection chains, employees needed to be able to "log in" to their selected workstations. In addition, the solution had to be available on employees' business or private smartphones without the need of installing an extra app. At the same time, it was important for the IT department to retain full control over the employees' data and to delete it automatically after the prescribed three to four weeks.
From handwritten lists to scan and go
While the infection chains were initially tracked via handwritten lists and Excel spreadsheets, the workstations have then been equipped with QR codes. When scanned with a smartphone camera, the code directly opens a web app. There, employees can book the respective workstation, and are simultaneously checked in for easier tracing in the event of infection. Employees can also easily check out by scanning the QR code again, or they will automatically be checked out at the end of each workday. The app asks for a name and contact details only during the initial registration.
Thanks to this new solution, Carglass can track which employees were in the office on a given day and which workstations they worked at. If an infection is reported, it is possible to track who should test for the virus.
On the back end, Carglass has the ability to enable and disable certain workstations whenever health and safety measures change again. Workstations that were originally adjacent to each other have been permanently disabled to reduce close contact. The settings are so easy to configure that not only the IT department, but also other departments are able to configure them.
The technical basis for the solution is Microsoft SharePoint, Power Automate and Dynamics 365 Customer Voice. As the systems were already available to Carglass, the solutions could be developed within four days.
Seamless infection chains - even in the canteen
The risk of infection in the canteen is the same as in the individual office rooms. For this reason, two additional QR codes have been added at the entry of the canteen. This gives employees the choice of eating on site or getting something for takeaway. Therefore, they can either scan the normal QR code or the one for the
so-called quick check-in. Depending on the scanned code, they are automatically logged out after 30 or after five minutes. In this way, chains of infection can be recorded in an uncomplicated manner, even for short encounters.
Scanned, booked and logged in
The web app, based on Microsoft technology, achieved the goal of keeping Carglass' open space offices open for employees despite the restrictions imposed by the Corona pandemic and tracking possible chains of infection. "The app was very well received by the employees and we have the possibility to customize and even develop it further if needed," Periklis Stavrinos is satisfied with the cooperation of novaCapta.
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Company Profile Carglass®
Carglass® is a specialist in the repair and new installation of vehicle glass. In Germany, Carglass® employs around 2,100 people, of whom over 1,600 are specially trained Carglass® mechanics. The company handles around 1.2 million customer contacts a year and helps drivers throughout Germany, either in one of its 345 service centers or on the road with more than 240 mobile units.
Technologies used
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Thomas Kogler
Head of Intelligent Business Platforms