Unum takes unique approach to handling pandemic

➤ Unum has not barred access to office space during the pandemic for employees who voluntarily choose to go in, although the vast majority have been working remotely.

➤ The life insurer plans to move toward a hybrid work model in the future, although what exactly that will entail has yet to be worked out.

Jeff Sheckley, assistant vice president of business resiliency at Unum Group, has been responsible for leading the life insurer's response to the COVID-19 pandemic. S&P Global Market Intelligence recently spoke with him to discuss how Unum is evaluating its office spaces, remote work and the strategy the company might consider in the future. The following conversation has been edited for clarity.

S&P Global Market Intelligence: What has it been like working remotely, and how have things been since the start of the pandemic until now?

Over the past 10 months, we have had the majority of folks working remotely, and we have looked at ways to support our employees and ensure that they continue to have connections with their colleagues. We saw some positives come out of that, and we saw some opportunities to adapt our campuses and offices as well. From a high level, we started the journey of responding to COVID-19 with some guiding principles to help us with our approach and decision-making as the pandemic has evolved. We started out with looking at the health, safety and well-being of our employees as our top priority, followed by ensuring that we are there to serve our customers.

We wanted to make sure that our employee experience and customer partner experience was consistent across all sites. We have seen a high level of productivity. We have been able to maintain the great level of service that our customers expect over the past 10 months.

Do you see remote work as a sustainable model to support the types of insurance that Unum sells?

Remote work has been part of our core work strategy for some time. Over the past few years, we have seen a significant increase in the population of employees that work remotely across multiple areas of the company, so the concept is not new to Unum. We see it as a key factor in our business continuity, having employees spread geographically to make sure we can continue to support our employees and keep company operations rolling.

With that, we have had a flexible inclusive model in place, and we have not closed our offices since the beginning of the pandemic. A small percentage of employees have been working in our offices on a voluntary basis over the past several months, and we do see that as sustainable in the months and years to come. We will adapt or adjust that strategy if the pandemic or other developments would call for changes in that approach.

We have seen our employees be very resilient with some tremendous support from company leadership in providing and embracing technology that has strengthened connections with colleagues working out of different locations, some remotely and others in the office.

We will have a hybrid work model in the future. What that looks like exactly is yet to be seen. We are closely monitoring the evolution of the pandemic and related developments. I also wanted to mention that the reason we have kept our offices open is that we recognized that some employees faced challenges working from home, whether it was young children, remote learning, or other distractions, and they wanted to come into the office and work from the campus. Unum has looked at additional ways to provide a clean and safe working environment for its employees. As we entered the pandemic, our real estate management teams implemented antimicrobial film covers for high touch point areas such as door handles, and they have continued to ensure safe working conditions in the office by introducing automatic door openers in places like restrooms or locker rooms in order to minimize touchpoints and keep a safe environment.

How much of the employee population is voluntarily going into the office right now?

It fluctuates from about 10% to 15%, and some of that may depend on the week or proximity to holidays.

Are you seeing any difference between a desire to go into the office in larger cities versus smaller campus locations?

I would say it varies. It's more of an individual decision and knowing that each individual may have unique circumstances. We have locations in both large and moderate-size cities. With large cities, I would say concerns around mass transit have been expressed. That is why, as a guiding principle, we have tried to remain flexible as we look at our approach and unique situations that individual employees may be facing.

How are you evaluating the office space that you have?

In terms of office space, we do not have plans to close any offices at this time. We did have an office closure in Worcester, Mass., over the summer, but that was unrelated to the pandemic. One of the factors we had in play there as we looked at the office closure was that it had been proven employees could successfully work remotely while maintaining customer service levels.

It was slated to happen. We had employee head count in the market decrease over the years to the point where we did not need all that additional space and it provided helpful insight into how successful the remote work was in serving our customers.

Has letting employees voluntarily work from the office been successful in terms of avoiding COVID-19 exposures at work?

Yes, it has, and we have continued to survey employees that are both working in the office and remotely. A high majority of employees have consistently shared their feedback that they feel safe, that the work environment is clean and they are comfortable working in the office.