b'WHAT WILL WORK LOOK LIKE IN THE FUTURE?As the world enters into a post-COVID state, businesses are asking: what does the future of work look like?Alex Martin and Marc ZienkiewiczAFTER A YEARand a half of a pandemic, and businessesto work with clients that he might not have been able to before. having to quickly shift from working in-house to workingVirtual offering has allowed us to invest in the chance to remote, seed companies have had their business plans flippedwork with India, Japan, Singapore, Brazil and more clients in on their heads.those spaces, he says. Its been a challenge, yet it has provided But after a long year and a half, its time to reevaluate. Howopportunity at the same time. Challenge comes with opportu-has COVID-19 affected businesses? Is remote work possiblenity, and thats what weve had to look at this year. long-term? Do businesses really need physical offices? The seed sector has been asking these questions frequentlyIs Remote an Option for Seed Companies?within the last year globally. So, is remote work here to stay, orFor a lot of seed companies, though, staying at home is not an will companies be returning to business-as-usual?option, Craven says. Those companies need to be present in front of that grower The Switch to Remote because theyre going to put something in the ground, he says. According to Doug Miller, executive director of the CanadianOn the other hand, you have folks in research, and thats been Seed Growers Association (CSGA) based in Ontario, Canada,a struggle because not everyone is back in lab unless its some-working remotely prior to the pandemic is a completely differ- thing mission critical.ent ballgame than currently. In addition, Craven says theres a lot of people in research that Miller has been a remote work warrior for five years, goingdont work in the lab, and instead work in cubicles. from living/working in a small condo to leaving the city duringTheres been an unfortunate disconnect because you dont the pandemic. have those watercooler discussions, and you dont see people Now, I feel that theres a sense that were all in this together,in the hallways, Craven says. Over the past 16 months, theres Miller says. Were all working remotely and its great. been a lot of adaptation to that, but its still not the same.Prior to the pandemic, Miller says it was more striking whenMiller agrees. Depending on the size and scope, CSGA you were the only one on a team working remotely.members have a lot of different activities ranging from You can get pretty isolated, and sometimes even feel likegrowing, conditioning, processing to selling, he says. Last youre on an island by yourself, he says. Sometimes Id work attime I checked, you cant grow seed remotely, so theres a lot home, sometimes Id go into a shared office workspace. Now, weof challenges here for our members on how theyre able to go need to be able to define the way to move everyone forward inabout their day-to-day.the world of work. Miller says currently, most CSGA members still have plans in In comparison, Spike Craven, president of Iowas Integrityplace to protect customers and employees, but there were still Communications, says the transition to remote work has beensome stories about outbreaks on operations. difficult.Luckily, the work CSGA does was considered to be an essen-One hundred percent of work that my organization did withtial service, so CSGA was able to maintain its schedule, but had our clients was in person, Craven says. When all of the sudden,to adapt and change, Miller says. we cant be meeting in person, that poses a grave danger to myWe had to put new digital processes in place, like digital crop business and my familys livelihood. certificates and COVID related business processes, to ensure Initially, Craven says he resisted working from home. business continuity, he says.I thought it would pass and that we didnt need to pivot theMiller says when considering remote work, you cant just flip a way we did business, Craven says. We eventually understood,switch and expect everyone to go remote. as many did, that was not the case. We made a significant invest- You cant just throw them in and hope that everything is ment in really adding to our business model so we could workgoing to be okay, Miller says. Hope is not a strategy when it with our clients in a more digital way. comes to remote work. You need to be able to have a framework Ultimately, Craven says remote work has given them chancesin place thats able to provide support to your employees.64/ SEEDWORLD.COMSEPTEMBER 2021'