The Impact on Employees from COVID-19, and the Companies They Work For

The+Impact+on+Employees+from+COVID-19%2C+and+the+Companies+They+Work+For

Riley Shea, Student Contributor

COVID-19 has taken the world by storm this year, and not in a good way. The virus has killed many and has had a huge toll on businesses both big and small. Many businesses aren’t able to operate like they used too and some can’t even operate at all. While that is true for a wide majority of businesses a few have actually benefited from the pandemic like streaming services (Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, etc.) and online stores like Ebay and Amazon. However while ignoring the few exceptions COVID-19 seems to have had an overall negative impact on business and here is how.

One of the major negative impacts we’ve seen from COVID has been the closure of many small businesses. In an article from the Washington Post we can see how a projected 100,000 small businesses have had to close forever due to the pandemic. The article says “The coronavirus pandemic is emerging as an existential threat to the nation’s small businesses — despite Congress approving a historic $700 billion to support them — with the potential to further diminish the place of small companies in the American economy.” which explains how the coronavirus has been extremely detrimental to these small businesses. All of these small business closures lead to a huge loss in jobs for their workers and a major loss of income for the owners. That is how COVID-19 has negatively impacted small businesses.

While that last negative impact focused on small businesses there has also been many ways COVID has negatively impacted big businesses. One of those ways is the social interacting that many businesses engage in like handshakes. In the two interviews I took a similarity between the two interviews was the mention of moving on from the handshake. Both interviewees said that they believed that the handshake would more than likely not be used after the pandemic along with less interaction in general. That is how COVID will impact social interactions of many businesses.

A final impact we see of COVID can be seen in many workers who have gone through this pandemic. Many of these workers don’t get as much social interaction due to their workplace being closed and them being locked down in general. In this article from McKinsey & Company we see how the pandemic has led to loneliness among workers. The article says “This week, we investigated loneliness and other effects of the lockdown and physical distancing in Europe. Across the Continent, the proportion of people who say that they feel lonely “most or all of the time” has nearly tripled. Loneliness is higher in countries, such as Bulgaria and Greece, where trust and satisfaction with relationships were already at low levels in 2018.” which shows how workers have felt more lonely due to an unprecedented increase in alone time. This can lead to many workers becoming depressed and not working to their best potential which can be bad for not only the business but the workers mental health as well. That is how COVID has had a negative impact on the workers of many businesses.

Overall we can see that excluding a few online companies COVID-19 has had an overall negative impact on many businesses and many aspects of those businesses. It’s negatively impacted both small and large businesses alike along with their workers. The pandemic will most definitely leave a lasting impact on many businesses whether it’s in how they function or whether or not the business will be around after it’s over. That is how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted business.