In the words of the great philosophers, the Foo Fighters;

It’s times like these you learn to live again

It’s times like these you give and give again

It’s times like these you learn to love again

We’ve seen daily demonstrations of these words throughout the COVID-19 crisis in our homes, in our communities but for us especially, at McKenzie & Co. Here are some of the things that times like these have taught us.

It’s times like these we realise that by socially distancing ourselves from our work mates, we’re becoming closer than ever.

We’ve seen an uptake in team meetings using online tools, like Zoom and Go-To-Meeting. Along with messenger-like programme, Slack and traditional email we’re more connected now than ever.

It’s times like these we live up to our number 8 wire reputation. Our Kiwi ingenuity is at its best in times of crisis.

We’re adapting to the unknown with pragmatism and a good sense of humour. Technology issues have largely been rectified with thanks to our IT support company, Swerve and our in-house tech-savviness. We’ve number 8 wired a bunch of software packages and platforms to our advantage. Now we’re working from home at near full capacity.

It’s times like these we appreciate strong leadership and clear communications.

We’re proud of our three directors and our extended leadership team for the regular, open and honest communications throughout this crisis. They’ve given us practical advice, confidence building guidance and humour all rolled into one. (We’re also pretty proud of our PM too.)

It’s time like these we care, we’re supportive and we’re the true sense of the word team..

We’re welcoming a new Design Engineer to the team in the middle of a lockdown (on April Fool’s Day no less). We’ve prepared a great virtual induction and have a week of meet and greets and training all lined up. We’re also looking forward to a welcome beer and game of pool as soon as lockdown allows for it.

It’s times like these we’re thankful for our incredible clients, contractors and suppliers.

We’ve had open dialogue with our development partners around continuing to deliver on our promises. We’ve had 100% commitment from all parties to continue working on projects until we physically and legally can do no more. We’re planning ahead for a post-lockdown restart where we’re going to hit the ground running like never before.

What are you learning about the resilience of your work place in times like these?