East Kilbride Housing Association is a small charitable housing association situated in central Scotland. Like so many businesses and organisations, the Covid-19 outbreak posed many challenges that it had to find ways around. Having done that successfully, chief executive Andy Young tells The Leaders Council that the focus now turns to expansion.
Speaking on The Leaders Council Podcast and recalling the early days of the pandemic in the UK, Young revealed how the operating model of the housing association meant that they were well prepared to adapt to new working practices. This, in the long run, made it far easier to get through the subsequent lockdowns as efficiently as possible.
Young said: “Luckily, we were relatively well prepared. We managed to source 15 more laptops, got our IT people to wire them into our systems for us and staff were able and ready to work from home pretty much from the start of lockdown. In fact, we were ahead of the game slightly and instructed staff to work from home one or two days before the announcement.”
However, adjusting to a remote working model did not come without some difficulties.
Young explained: “Obviously, managing a remote workforce has its challenges. You have really got to keep a close watch on everybody, and people's mental health at the time was all over the place. Certainly, during the initial lockdown, the novelty of working from home aside you soon realise that it was a completely different experience for everyone. Some people revelled in it, while others who were stuck working in small flats without a garden space really struggled. Home schooling was also going on so being trapped in a small property with children and pets and having to manage that plus working responsibilities made it difficult for many.
“Of course, working remotely also made it difficult to keep a watchful eye on everyone. A two-dimensional picture of somebody on a video call doesn’t always give you the clue that something isn’t right. I do like to see body language and we couldn’t get a great deal of that. But we managed through it and I’m a believer that what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.”
A candid Young also told that as well as looking to safeguard the mental health and wellbeing of his colleagues, he also needed to prioritise his own to maximise his performance at the top of the organisation. In this respect, he paid tribute to his fellow senior leaders within East Kilbride Housing Association for offering the support that he needed.
“All the leaders listening to this will empathise with the fact that being at the top of an organisation can be a lonely place at the best of times, and Covid was anything but the best of times. Luckily in my role I was well supported. I have a good board of directors around me, and the chairperson was very supportive during the initial lockdown period and was probably on the phone every other day to check up on me. In that sense, I didn’t feel quite so isolated.”
With the trajectory of the virus in early 2022 signalling what could be the end of the acute phase of the pandemic in the UK, an optimistic Young said that focus in now turning toward the post-Covid world, with the housing association planning some exciting expansions of its services to help on the road to a more prosperous future.
Young said: “We want to continue developing new properties in East Kilbride. We were out of the development game for quite some time and our first development after several years was about a month away from completion when Covid struck. One of the main contractors then wound up in financial difficulties, which is a major obstacle even in normal times. So, albeit it was a nightmare in those circumstances, we rallied and got through it. Now, we want to continue to build houses, house homeless people, expand our services and provide a wider offering.
“East Kilbride is a town of around 85,000 people and there are pockets of deprivation, many of which are where our properties are, so sometimes we tend to miss out on the kind of grants that big city associations get. We will be working very hard on improving our performance on that to help us move forward and are excited for the future.”
Photo by Emma Houghton on Unsplash
