Workday Podcast: VMware’s Holistic Approach to the Virtual Workplace

Audio is also available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

Maintaining connection and engagement with a remote workforce requires more than just at-home gear and VPNs. Companies need to support their staff as they navigate video-meeting fatigue and new family challenges around daycare, remote learning, mental health, and more.

In this episode of the Workday Podcast, Amy Gannaway, vice president of global compensation, benefits, and HRIS at VMware explains how her organization is driving growth despite the shift to a 100% remote workforce. She also shares why it’s important to take a holistic approach in helping employees adapt and thrive amid the challenges that come with pandemic living.

Here are some highlights Amy shared during our conversation, edited for clarity. You can find our other Workday podcasts here.

• “I think employee engagement is directly correlated with well-being, so that has been front and center for us. Expanding our well-being programs has been on our roadmap globally for several years, but we're looking to make some significant progress and changes with enhancements coming in 2021. In particular, mental health is top of the list, so we’re looking at new programs to support employees and their families. We're also looking at well-being from a holistic perspective and have pivoted what used to be a program focused purely on physical fitness and making it much broader, so people can tap into all the different areas of well-being in their life.”

• “Most of our global offices are closed, but we do have occasions when people might need to come in and get equipment, for example. To make sure they’re going into an office in a safe way, they first have to sign our regional safety compliance agreement. Using existing functionality in Workday, we were able to have over 40,000 global employees and contingent workers read and sign that document in just a few days. We've also hired several thousand employees since the pandemic started. By using a combination of technologies, including Workday, we’ve been able to onboard them electronically, from filling out their I-9 form to enrolling for benefits. Of course people still miss the in-person interaction, but given the circumstances, our seamless digital workflows have been really well received.”

• “Our people are juggling big changes at work and at home. Their work, social lives, and kids’ schooling are now mostly virtual. To help our employees adjust to this new reality, and pace themselves better, we’ve taken a holistic approach. We introduced a ‘pandemic leave,’ which gives people 10 additional days off during the year, and we’ve adjusted our standard meeting times to 25 or 50 minutes to make sure everyone gets those needed breaks throughout the day to stretch or eat a snack.”