Régis NOURY (Agriculture, 2006, Beauvais), Director CLAAS Auvergne tells us about his week.

Find daily news of Alumni facing the pandemic: between those who work, telework, confined to their homes at rest or even on the other side of the world ... We give you news!

We start today with the testimony of Régis NOURY (Agriculture, 2006, Beauvais), Director of CLAAS Auvergne, who looks back on the evolution of the measures he had to take during the previous week.

CLAAS Auvergne

How can a farm equipment concession maintain service to farmers in times of health crisis?

Thursday 12 March 2020: Emmanuel Macron announces the closure of schools from Monday 16 March and asks employers to encourage teleworking. Employees without childcare solutions will be on sick leave to take care of their children.

Friday 13 March 2020 : As part of a group of ten concessions, in the morning, we hold a telephone meeting that will be the first of many. We are coordinating our first collective actions to encourage teleworking by employees in order to implement barrier gestures in our companies (and ensure the safety of our employees) and to list the number of employees who will be absent from work on Monday 16 March to take care of their children.

Sales teams who are mainly outside the company are no longer allowed to return to the walls to avoid contact with their sedentary colleagues.

Monday 16 March 2020 : Containment announcement by Emmanuel Macron. A strong but still too ambiguous speech for a large part of the teams. We must be confined but we must continue to work. Indeed, our role of service to farmers is an essential link in the food chain. Doubts are settling in the heads of the employees.

I have to reassure them without mastering all the ins and outs of this crisis.

We are looking for more gloves and hydro-alcoholic gel but we are not the only ones...

Tuesday, March 17, 2020: The virus continues to spread. We need to strengthen the protection measures for our teams and our customers while continuing to provide service to them. The puzzle continues...

The decision is made to impose teleworking on the sales team. We know that this situation can only be temporary, but we are dealing with the most urgent situation. Our salespeople must not be vectors for the transmission of the virus.

However, the farmers continue to work and our technicians have to carry out their activities of troubleshooting and preparation of equipment. But they are worried. The President hammered home the day before that this is a serious matter, that we are at war and that we must stay home, but we are asking them to continue to come to our businesses and to visit the farms.

I have to make sure that the customers respect the gestures that are being put up as barriers, and that is not yet fully in place. The instructions are clear: if a customer stays close to them during a breakdown, they leave. Their health comes before service.

Wednesday 18 March 2020 : The ministers clarify their position: the workers needed to maintain the essential activities of our country must continue their work while protecting themselves. For all that, equipment dealers do not have priority for access to protective equipment, but with rigour, we manage to ensure the safety of our employees.

In the middle of the afternoon, a new directive was issued: employees with poor health must stay at home. This means that 10% of our employees leave the company. We have to reorganise again.

Thursday, March 19, 2020: The teams continue to work, but external factors start to seriously disrupt our business: the parts and materials factories are closing one after the other. Our employees are on deck but we have less and less spare parts available to do the interventions. When they are available, we don't know the deadlines for receiving them. The transporters are like us, they do their best with the available teams.

The Ministers of Economy and Finance and of Agriculture and Food are co-writing a letter to reaffirm that all the links in the food chain must continue their work to ensure healthy and sufficient food for our compatriots.

Friday 20 March 2020 : Complex situation: the weather is fine, our customers are in the fields or on the farms. We should be overwhelmed with work, but the transporters are always moving with increasing difficulty.

We have to take strong decisions: for the first time in the history of our concession, short-time working measures will be implemented.

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