We all know things have changed since the pandemic started and countries around the world went into lockdowns. Some changes have been highly visible, while others were gradual and may be less obvious. While nearly all of these things were happening before the pandemic, the lockdowns and lifestyle changes forced them to become mainstream quickly. Here are some of the ways the Covid 19 pandemic has changed our world:
Great Resignation
The great resignation may become a more important social change than the economic impact from the lockdown. While recessions are normal and cyclical, the great resignation is a shift in the way people think about work and workers.
The great resignation refers to the shift in employee behavior and mindset that occurred after the pandemic. People are changing jobs and quitting jobs, and employees are demanding better work conditions, better pay, and more flexible jobs.
Remote work and flexible hours are just one part of the shift. From supply chain disruptions to staff shortages in areas as diverse as education, healthcare, and fast food, we’ve all felt the waves that have resulted from the shifts in the workforce.
Focus on Sanitization
While we certainly hope people were washing their hands and covering their sneezes before the pandemic started, personal hygiene and sanitization has become much more important now. While the rush for hand sanitizer, masks, and strangely, toilet paper, was concerning during the lockdown, those items are now easy to find.
Hand sanitizer is available everywhere. Stores provide masks freely to anyone who needs them. Workplaces are installing PPE vending machines to easily and safely provide masks and other items to workers. The idea of wearing a mask when you’re sick and washing your hands often seems to have become accepted and may be here to stay.
Catch Phrases
During the early stages of the pandemic, we all heard a lot of new (or new to us) phrases that have now become normal parts of our speech. Phrases like “social distancing”, “peaks”, “PPE”, “essential workers”, and many others got added to our global lexicon and seem to be here to stay.
Virtual Education
The pandemic forced us to evaluate the way we do education. And while shifts in thinking seem to take a long time to affect the education system, some changes came fast. Online public education, which was becoming more popular before the pandemic, has shot into focus as a more mainstream form of education.
Homeschooling became more common, as some parents found it easier to teach their own children than help them with online classes. As school gets back to normal, these fringe forms of education have become more socially acceptable and even trendy.
Telemedicine
Telemedicine became huge during the pandemic. While it had been increasing in use before the Covid hit, it became much more important during the lockdown. While healthcare workers were swamped with a health crisis, other people simply needed prescriptions renewed and antibiotics prescribed for simple infections. Those cases could easily and quickly be handled through telemedicine, saving hours of time and limiting the risk of spreading the virus.
Now it seems telemedicine is here to stay for many mild medical needs, and most people would much rather spend 15 minutes on the phone rather than an hour in the office.
Remote Working
Remote working was on a gradual rise before the pandemic, but it was still a fringe part of the work force. During the lockdown, businesses discovered they could save money and employees discovered they could save time by working remotely. Nearly all workers in the US would prefer to work remotely at least part of the time. While there are many jobs that cannot be done remotely, more and more companies are innovating and finding solutions that support part- or full-time remote work.
Virtual Everything
During the lockdown, online meetings and classrooms became the daily commute for millions of people. Tech companies were forced to adapt and innovate in a hurry, and virtually everything became normal. After the pandemic, while some things have reversed back to in-person situations, other things seem to work better virtually. Virtual job interviews save time for everyone. Virtual work meetings eliminate travel times and expenses for things like conference, rooms, food, and print-outs. Virtual medicine saves huge amounts of time and money. Virtual classes and training allow groups from all over the world to attend without expenses.
Virtual shopping was big before the pandemic, but it’s become even bigger in the months and years since the lock-down. And virtual shoppers seem to be more likely to make purchases, rather than just browse. Virtual shoppers often visit online stores ready to buy.
Relationship Changes
Another way the pandemic has changed us seems to be in the way we view and do relationships. While video chat became common during the lockdown, people also began to value their in-person relationships more. Social media is being criticized on all fronts as less valuable than authentic, in-person relationships.
When people began meeting together again, it was with a refreshed sense of the value of in-person interactions. So while video chats and phone calls keep us close to people we’re far away from, we also started placing more value on being physically together with people nearby.
New Hobbies
During the lockdown, many people started viewing their free time as a valuable commodity. People tried an abundance of new hobbies, many of which stuck. Many people said they found out how important downtime is. This focus on lifestyle and mental health may be fueling some of the workplace changes that employees are demanding.