How Guider’s Partners Are Making A Difference During Covid-19

As Covid-19 leaves a quarter of the world’s population in lockdown, more and more businesses and individuals are taking action to support any way they can.

At Guider we’ve been delighted to hear of the positive strategies our partners are taking in order to make a difference during this uncertain and frightening time.

LVMH

LVMH hit headlines last week due to the fact that they have directed all of their perfume factories to start producing hand sanitiser in a bid to tackle France’s shortage. LVMH’s Chairman and Chief Exec Bernard Arnault instructed the factories to switch production, and are supplying the sanitiser free of charge. LVMH have sworn that they will ‘continue to honor this commitment for as long as necessary’, in a statement given on March 15th.

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Not only this, the conglomerate also plans to order 40 million hygiene masks from China to supply to the French health service. Having already successfully ordered 10 million from a Chinese supplier, LVMH plans to make the same order every week for the next month. This initiative, costing a total of €5 million, will help the country as they suffer from shortages.

We’re incredibly proud to work with LVMH at this time, and admire their response to the current crisis. Guider began working with LVMH in October 2019 to support their women in leadership mentoring program as part of the EllesVMH gender diversity initiative.

Marks & Spencer

Marks & Spencer have responded equally quickly to the Coronavirus pandemic. As of last Friday, they began reserving the first hour of trading across 4 days of the week to the elderly, vulnerable and those working for the NHS / Emergency Services. With more and more people panic buying and store shelves left empty across the country, these are crucial measures to protect the most vulnerable people in our society.

Stores selling only Clothing and Home are now closed, however the C&H teams will be joining the Food teams to help with increased demand. M&S have also put social distancing measures in place across their stores, with many putting floor markings down near checkouts to ensure people are staying the recommended 2m away from one another, and sneeze guards being installed at till points.

As well as these measures, M&S is also kickstarting the Neighbourly Community Fund, to support those most impacted by COVID-19. It’s great to see how quickly M&S have adapted in times of crisis, and we’re glad that we can support them with mentoring during this period.

“Our primary focus in these uncertain times is on the mental and physical health of our people, which is why it’s been so important to keep our mentoring programme running as usual. Thanks to Guider’s platform and integrated video chat, this has been possible. Now, more than ever, people across M&S will be needing additional support, so having an active culture of mentoring is extremely beneficial.” – Suzie King, Talent Specialist at M&S.

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RB

Meanwhile, RB (Reckitt Benckiser) have been active in tackling Coronavirus on a global scale since January, having donated £5.5 million in cash and antibacterial products to combat the outbreak in China. Their cleaning and disinfectant products were used to help meet the cleaning and disinfection requirements in Wuhan’s hospitals.

More recently, Lysol has donated $2 million to the CDC Foundation’s new Coronavirus campaign, ‘All of Us: Combat Coronavirus’, helping to address fast emerging needs posed by the virus, with a preference toward supporting schools, students and children.

And their efforts are not slowing down, this week, RB has partnered with public health experts in a bid to tackle fake news during these unprecedented times. They launched covid-19facts.com as a source to help people find facts rather than myths while researching Coronavirus online.

As well as this, in India, RB are distributing 10 million Dettol soaps and 3.5 million N95 masks to the most vulnerable in society. This is part of their Fight for Access Fund which has seen £32 million being mobilised to help fight the spread of Covid-19.

RB have been a real inspiration in the speed and generosity of their support across the globe during this pandemic, and as always, we’re proud to work with them.

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It’s been incredible to see these responses from Guider partners to the pandemic. We’re confident that with more companies and individuals doing what they can, we will have a united impact. Guider hope that we can continue to support our partners’ remote teams with mentoring during this time of uncertainty.

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