04 Jan Happy New Year!
Finally, the new year is here. And I always see the new year as a time for hope. Hope for the future of course, but also hope that we can make some changes to improve upon the last year. Hope that we can make right some of the wrongs. And there was so much wrong with the year 2020!
But out of the bad always comes good. As we faced the challenges presented by COVID-19, we learned a lot about infection and prevention, among many other things. At ARCSI, we were fortunate to have a partner in the Global Biorisk Advisory Council (GBAC), a division of ISSA, and they led the development of tremendous resources as we learned more about the virus and provided training to the cleaning industry worldwide. If you haven’t visited this page recently, I encourage you to visit the “Cleaning and Disinfecting for the Coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2)” on the ISSA website where there are a wealth of links to information and training.
Another good that has come from this year was the strength we found in our community. I have also felt blessed to work with the residential cleaning community. Within any association, there is a bond over shared work lives. But our residential cleaning community goes well beyond that – there is more of a family-like feeling than I have ever seen. This group celebrates the wins of their peers and provides support during challenges. Our members are also willing to share and help their peers succeed. And during this pandemic, our community has become even stronger for it. If you haven’t already done so, please join ARCSI’s private Facebook group and begin making the connection within our community.
We were also able to establish that the cleaning industry is an essential. As Gosia Baran, owner of Helping Hands Maid Services, told her team, “It’s so important that your team feels your support and they understand their mission. I reminded my team that the world needs us. We are not cleaning for appearances anymore. We are cleaning for health. We needed our cleaners to understand that they are essential workers.”
During the ISSA Show in November, we put together a panel to talk about “How Covid-19 Created Opportunity For Many Cleaning Businesses!” The panel was phenomenal and while I can’t share the panel with you unless you attended the show, I will share the handout which features an interview with each panelist and some great insights on how to take the many curves thrown at you from the virus and use them to help your business.
So as we move forward in the new year, let’s focus on the good things that have come out of 2020 and find ways to improve on the things that went wrong last year – and together we can change the way the world views cleaning.