I mentioned yesterday that we at D Magazine were wrestling with what our office should do with its employees, given the spread of the novel coronavirus. This morning, we made a decision. Starting Monday, for at least the next two weeks — probably longer — everyone in our office who can work from home is expected to do so. We aren’t closing the place down. We will still hold smaller meetings up here. Some people will need to remain in the office to keep the machines humming. And during the latter stages of our monthly print production process, a small crew will still need to be here, still need to hand page designs to each other.
But otherwise? We are going to do our best to create the social distancing that health officials say gives our country the best shot at slowing the spread of the virus. We see it as a civic issue, a responsibility we are prepared to handle with the help of Microsoft Teams and Zoom and our virtual private network.
Gentlemen, we can rebuild him. We have the technology. We have the capability to build the world’s first bionic man.
Maybe that Six Million Dollar Man quote doesn’t quite do it. But we do have the technology.
It’s interesting to see how quickly attitudes seem to be changing. If we’d announced this to our company on Monday morning, I think it would have been an ugly situation. But here we are. Ursuline Academy has shut it doors. The St. Patrick’s Day Parade has been canceled. March Madness will be played in empty arenas (save for family members). This is the new reality for the coming weeks. Our staff confronts it with equanimity.
Here, again, are the steps you can take to protect yourself and others, no matter where you do your job. Together, we’ll get through this.
