What is the impact of Covid19 on your job?
Resist, adapt: These are the terms that come to mind to remember the path that we had to take from the beginning of this unprecedented health crisis. Never have we questioned our practices so much, even those that were harmless until now. History always reminds us that upheavals are born from new energies or wills. In a company born in 1872 we must be able to say that change is naturally part of our genes!
We have never stopped saying it but above all demonstrating it on a daily basis. YES we have been forced to adapt our human and technical resources in order to remain standing in all situations in all our businesses; YES we have kept our entire organization operational at 100% for all our customers around the world and in France in particular. Because when volumes drop by 60% in a few days, then exceed those of 2019 on the road perimeter after the national deconfinement, remaining upright takes on its full meaning.
Why this desire to stay positive, to carry out solidarity actions?
#TransportHeroes #LogisticsHeroes #HomeOfficeHeroes #RestonsTogether : these are not just hashtags placed there by chance, it is the reality on the ground which gave rise to them. Because all the teams on the road, in the agency, at home, through courage and self-sacrifice, showed resilience. Resilience is this word often used rightly or wrongly, but which perfectly symbolizes the work accomplished to ensure that from the most basic to the most complex services of our profession as transporter and logistician, these become so precious and real to the eyes of the greatest number. Above all, we promoted on the networks the action of our teams firstly on the ground (our delivery drivers, dock agents, customer services) by collecting a huge number of photos in situ to quite simply assert our presence and demonstrate at the same time the importance of the transport sector to transport the materials and products necessary for our daily lives. With the promotion of teleworking teams and the fact of having demonstrated availability to our customers, we have composed the visual that you find below.
But that's not all, we continued our societal and solidarity actions as much as possible and numerous actions were carried out, the main ones: transporting disinfection equipment free of charge on behalf of ACF (Action Against Hunger) to make it available to the most deprived, transporting medical equipment and materials for hospital staff in Paris, free delivery to the Strasbourg food bank, free offer of 300,000 respiratory protection masks to the ARS des Alpes Maritimes at the height of the crisis.
It is our duty to take part in these actions which took place in our country, but beyond this duty I'd like to stress that every member of the company has been a hero on a day-to-day basis as they have carried out their now much more complex tasks.
Will your job change thanks to the crisis? If so, how do you envision it?
Yes of course it will evolve, as society as a whole will evolve! It is still difficult to define the outline of all the changes that await us. First of all, we need to adapt to the volumes we will have to handle tomorrow. The start of the new school year in September will set the trend in volumes for us as carriers, because we are a direct indicator of the level of consumption in a country. Currently the aeronautics sector is hard hit and this impacts us on our Air and also road side; At the same time, the DIY and luxury sectors, as well as many French SMEs, are booming and this has a positive impact on us.
The real question beyond an economic crisis that specialists predict will also be whether relocations in France and Europe will occur, whether our compatriots will favor short and therefore European circuits to the detriment of other origins, it is still too early to know. What has changed is above all the relationship with others, teleworking is becoming a norm but it will have to find its balance between the social links established in the office and indeed a balance to be found with the “home office”. On the ground our delivery people are already delivering “contactless”, something unimaginable a few months ago, our technologies will inevitably evolve in this direction to isolate this viral fear. Finally, the processes already underway based on the best customer experience will accelerate and digitalization will continue, from September we are launching a chatbot on our website and on Facebook so that our customers can obtain the maximum number of responses in real time. Changes are accelerating, we are ready.
In conclusion: THANK YOU, a simple word that we address to all the customers who follow us and trust us, but also and above all to the teams who have been able to respond throughout this period which has not yet given its epilogue.
To know more : www.dbschenker.com/fr-fr
Read all the “Expert Opinion” articles on the SprintProject blog
