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As vaccines become available for more phases of people across the country, companies are developing, implementing, and clarifying plans to bring their employees back in-person. One thing that all companies agreed upon is mask-wearing, according to a survey conducted online in March by global outplacement and business and executive coaching firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas, Inc.

In the survey of 201 Human Resources executives at companies of various sizes and industries nationwide, 100% of respondents said they would require or do require mask-wearing for their in-person staff. That is up from 92.9% of respondents who said they would require masks in June 2020. Of those, 42.4% will require masks all the time, while the remaining 57.6% will require them in shared spaces.

The unanimous mask-wearing requirement was the only precaution more companies adopted in March, as compared to a similar survey conducted by Challenger among 150 companies in June of last year.

“Mask-wearing has been shown to be effective in containing the spread of airborne viruses. It makes sense that companies would embrace it in order to bring their workers back in-person safely,” said Andrew Challenger, Senior Vice President of Challenger, Gray & Christmas, Inc.


In the latest survey, 22% of companies are ensuring most of their workers are vaccinated before returning to the office. Of those respondents, 45% were Technology companies and 18% were Health Care firms. Of all respondents, Technology companies comprised 24% and Health Care comprised 19%.

When asked whether employers have brought their workers back in-person, of the 96% of companies that reported they moved some or all of their workers to remote, 33% reported they have brought back all or some of their workers to the office. Another 63% are in the planning stages, with 14% planning to bring all of their workers back in-person, something a few respondents lamented in their comments. Nearly 5% had not brought anyone back into the office and had no plans to do so.

When asked if companies planned to keep their workers remote, the vast majority (79%) plan to institute a hybrid work arrangement where workers may come in some days and work remotely some days, or keep certain categories of their workers remote permanently. Of those, nearly 3% report they will listen to their workers, either giving them a choice to come back or basing their policies on what workers want.

This jibes with Challenger’s June survey, which revealed that 43.3% of companies plan to keep most of their employees working at home even after the pandemic passes and 30% said they would transition some of their employees to work from home following the pandemic after implementing it successfully due to COVID.

Few companies will mandate the vaccine, but the majority will strongly encourage their workers to receive it. Over 57% of employers reported they will encourage employees to receive the vaccine. Over 33% stated they will not mandate it, and 6% are determining their approach to the vaccine.