Questions abound during the COVID-19 pandemic, and Collective Health is stepping up to throw its expertise into the ring.
“We launched a public COVID-19 online resource that includes materials to help people stay safe, healthy and informed,” said Chief People Officer Abbie Buck. “We also launched a 60-second risk assessment tool for people to understand their risks of exposure or symptoms.”
Those efforts underscore a wider effort by the company, which aims to simplify employee healthcare with its integrated technology solution, to support individuals with additional information and resources. Accordingly, the company’s own workforce has had to respond to ramped-up demand.
“As a company that provides an essential service — employee healthcare coverage — our greatest challenge has been ensuring that our workforce and operations continue to function at normal levels, despite moving our entire workforce remote,” said Buck.
Below, Buck outlined how the team has made that transition while serving customers during this critical time.
How is your company currently contributing to the COVID-19 efforts?
We offer a technology-driven alternative to employee healthcare for more than 50 companies representing nearly a quarter-million people across the U.S. Therefore, we’ve had the opportunity to support our members in helping them understand, navigate and pay for their healthcare in new ways during this crisis. We are directing people to safe options for care, like telemedicine; we are also working with customers’ employers to respond to legislation and expand coverage for testing and treatment. For the community at large, and our own employees, we launched a public COVID-19 online resource that includes materials to help people stay safe, healthy and informed. We also launched a 60-second risk assessment tool for people to understand their risks of exposure or symptoms.
We launched a public COVID-19 online resource that includes materials to help people stay safe.”
What is the greatest challenge COVID-19 has presented to your team and how are you overcoming it?
As a company that provides an essential service — employee healthcare coverage — our greatest challenge has been ensuring that our workforce and operations continue to function at normal levels, despite moving our entire workforce remote. We had to be prepared to manage a surge in member inquiries during a health crisis, and our team has risen to the challenge. In addition to our aforementioned resources, we’ve shipped multiple COVID-19 product updates. We’ve oriented our customer experience team to prioritize COVID-19-related inquiries from our members. We have been able to service these inquiries at the same rate and, in many cases, faster than our normal response times.
What impact have these events had on your overall business, product and hiring plans?
The biggest impact has been a shift in resourcing toward ensuring that we’re equipped to continue servicing our members and clients. Our remote work contingency plan, spearheaded by an internal COVID-19 task force, has allowed us to continue to operate at a high level. We built new processes to make sure our customer experience and clinical support teams had the ability to conduct work remotely and securely, including secure phone calls and messaging. This has all been solidified, and there have been no changes to our hours of operation as we’ve worked diligently to ensure minimal disruption.
Through all of this, we’re still hiring. Our mission is as important as it has ever been and we look forward to welcoming new colleagues to join us on this journey.
