COVID-19 Digest: March 11

COVID-19 Digest: March 11

March 11, 2020 • Estimated Reading Time: 7 minutes

COVID-19 Digest

Wednesday, March 11, 2020Tech:NYC’s COVID-19 resource guide is available here. It’s updated daily with the latest info from across the NYC tech sector.Email us at [email protected] with anything you’d like to see included in an upcoming email or with other feedback. Please share this with your networks and encourage your colleagues to sign up here.

The Latest in New York

The latest: it’s officially a global pandemic; tech companies head to the White House; tips for dealing with aging parents.Confirmed cases: 

  • New York State: 216 (+43)

  • New York City: 52 (+16)

General updates:

  • The World Health Organization officially declared COVID-19 a global pandemic, “which is generally defined as an illness that spreads far and wide throughout the world.” (CNBC)

  • The White House convened a meeting with some of the world’s largest tech companies to discuss the role tech can play in helping analyze and combat the COVID-19 outbreak. (Washington Post)

  • Gov. Cuomo announced that New York State will start contracting with more than 25 private labs in New York to increase the state’s testing capacity. (Twitter)

  • As of yesterday, rush hour traffic in New York City dropped 15 percent. (Crain’s) After being outside today, we think that number will get much higher.

What You Need to Know

NEW EMPLOYER UPDATES (for the full list, see our resource guide):

  • Billie: NYC office is closed and employees are required to work remotely for the remainder of the week; reassessing on a weekly basis.

  • Casebook PBC: requiring work from home for all New York employees until the end of the month; until the end of April, travel to the New York office requires senior executive level authorization.

  • Civic Hall: temporarily closing the Civic Hall community space starting at the close of business Thursday, March 12th.

  • Digital Currency Group: asking employees to work from home.

  • Floating Point Group: encouraging employees to work from home beginning Friday, March 13th.

  • Google: restricting external visitors to the NYC office, and encouraging employees across all North American offices to work from home until April 10th.

  • Grammarly: requiring SF, New York, and Vancouver employees to work from home; encouraging Kyiv employees to work from home.

  • HireArt: giving option to WFH for NYC office and other locations.

  • IBM: encouraging employees that live and/or work in NYC or Westchester County, and whose job permits, to work from home until further notice.

  • Salesforce: strongly encouraging employees to work from home until March 31st.

  • Shutterstock: cancelling all non-essential business travel; U.S. offices remain open, but with optional work from home policies.

  • Updater: voluntary and discretionary WFH across all offices; mandatory WFH for high-risk employees and/or employees working in high-risk geographies.

  • Zillow: expanding ‘encouraged work from home’ to all offices beginning March 11th through March 20th, 2020.

  • Request: please let us know if you are instituting mandatory, optional, or other work-from-home policies. Sharing this information is helpful to companies and employees across the NYC ecosystem and can be kept anonymous. 

WORKPLACE TOOLS:

  • Amtrak:waiving change fees on all existing or new reservations made before April 30th, 2020.

  • Box: existing enterprise customers may add any additional users beyond their license limits for the next month at no cost.

  • Business Council of NYS: A video webinar from Frank Kerbein, Director of the Center for Human Resources, on managing the day to day business implications of coronavirus.

  • INK: tips on how to pivot company comms in light of coronavirus.

  • Zapier: hosting a live AMA with executives from Trello, WildBit, Hubspot, and MeetEdgar on how to transition to remote work in a hurry. Friday, 11am EST. More details.

  • Read: the Harvard Business Review on how working parents can prepare for coronavirus closures. Get it here. 

  • Reminder: Tech:NYC’s COVID-19 resource guide is available here. The guide has a running list of all company policies we know about.

EVENTS:

  • Cancelled: NYC St. Patrick’s Day Parade. (NY1)

  • Postponed: City & State’s Digital NY Summit. (City & State)

  • Postponed: New York International Auto show will be rescheduled to August 2020. (Crain’s)

  • Postponed: New York Fintech Week will be rescheduled to October 2020. (Website)

  • March 31: Disruption Forum New York will now be 100 percent online. (Website)

POLICY UPDATES:

  • Gov. Cuomo announced that New York State will guarantee two full weeks of paid leave for all state workers who are quarantined on in isolation due to COVID-19. (Twitter)

SCHOOLS: 

  • CUNY: following Spring Break recess, all CUNY schools will move to distance-learning classes beginning March 19th for the remainder of the semester. CUNY’s 25 campuses, including dorms, libraries, research facilities, and essential on-campus services will remain open.

  • New York Law School: classes from March 18th - April 5th will be online only; all on-campus events are canceled through April 5.

  • SUNY: following Spring Break recess, all SUNY schools will move to distance-learning classes beginning March 19th for the remainder of the semester.

  • NYC public schools: all parent-teacher conferences scheduled for this week will not be conducted over the phone or via video chat (New York Times)

HOW TO HELP YOUR AGING PARENTS:

  • Common Sense Ways To Protect Aging Parents From Coronavirus And Still Keep Them Engaged (Forbes)

  • What Older Adults Need to Know (National Council on Aging)

When In Doubt

Check these sources for verified information from government agencies and public health authorities: