Tech:NYC Digest: January 10

Tech:NYC Digest: January 10

January 10, 2022 • Estimated Reading Time: 9 minutes

Monday, January 10, 2022

Happy Monday, hope you’re staying warm out there! In today’s digest, Omicron-targeted vaccine announced, Mayor Adams considers student vax mandate, and a conversation with Grubhub’s Becky Altman on the future of company culture.

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By the numbers: 

  • New positive cases statewide: 54,479

    • New positive cases, NYC: 32,236

  • NYC Positivity Rate: 20.6 percent (-0.5 percent)

  • NYC Hospitalizations: 6,245 (+123)

  • Statewide Vaccine Progress: 

    • Percentage of adults (18+) with at least one dose: 95.0 percent

    • Percentage of total population with at least one dose: 85.4 percent

Today’s latest: 

  • Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla announced today that a vaccine that targets Omicron and all other existing variants will be ready in March. The company has already begun manufacturing the doses. (CNBC) 

  • Mayor Eric Adams is meeting with healthcare professionals to weigh a COVID-19 vaccine mandate for students to attend in-person classes this fall. (New York Daily News)

  • Updated guidance from the CDC will allow some high-risk people to receive a fourth dose of the vaccine beginning this week. (New York Times) For severely immunocompromised people, a third shot was considered part of the primary immunization series, making a fourth dose a booster shot.

  • Forty hospitals across upstate New York, none in NYC, will be required to pause elective surgeries due to an influx of COVID-19 patients.(New York Times)

  • A new plan by Pres. Biden will require private insurers to cover the cost of at least eight at-home COVID tests per person per month. (New York Times)

  • And you can breathe a sigh of relief: “Deltacron” isn’t a real thing after all.

In other reading:

  • The ultimate guide to reusing and buying N95 masks (Popular Science)

  • Much of America isn't tracking at-home COVID test results (Axios)

  • Is ‘forever boosting’ in our future? And will that beat the coronavirus? (New York Times)

How you can help: the Mayor’s Fund is raising money to support the victims and families impacted by yesterday's tragic residential fire in the Bronx. You can give here or find a list of other high-need items to donate here.

Many of us have become amateur epidemiologists throughout the pandemic, but the most qualified among them has to be HR leaders, or as the New York Times put it, the new company nurse. 

The pandemic has put complex public health questions directly on the desks of HR teams, and those added dimensions are shaping the future of HR jobs.

We spoke to Becky Altman, Grubhub’s senior manager for culture and community, about how she’s managed to guide the company’s employees through the pandemic:

  • “Like most organizations, this is still a constant discussion and ever-evolving timeline. We believe in the value of an in-person culture, but we also know our people appreciate the flexibility that working remotely has afforded them, and that will continue to be a pillar of future reopening plans.”

Grubhub’s offices have been open in a voluntary capacity to fully vaccinated employees since May 2021, and it’s been working with a medical consultant to monitor health data and advise on workplace safety protocols.

Altman has been focused on how to keep remote and in-person employees equally engaged and connected:

  • “We spend a lot of time seeking feedback from our people to understand what’s most important and effective. There is definitely some Zoom fatigue with virtual happy hours, but we offer many ways to stay connected, both live and asynchronous. It all comes down to choice — providing as many options for people to stay connected in a way that adds value.”

  • Some of those options include Wellness Wednesday fitness and mindfulness classes, and further support of its Employee Resource Groups and their new proposed initiatives.

But what feels like a wave of new responsibilities has made Altman reflect on her own job description as an HR leader:

  • “The core of my job has always been about driving an inclusive, productive employee experience, and a few words I would highlight now are empathy, flexibility, and innovation. COVID-19 has been an incredible disruptor and instead of viewing this as a negative, we see it has an opportunity to redefine our culture and how we want to operate moving forward — how we work, what our space looks like, tools for collaboration, choice in how we socialize, learn, engage. It’s not about getting back to ‘normal.’ It’s about growth.”

What does Altman think about the future of company culture? Office-only strategies won’t be the future of work, and so office-based solutions won’t be enough.

  • “As we look to 2022 and beyond, workplace culture has to look beyond office perks, swag, and virtual happy hours. We have to look holistically at people as individuals with diverse backgrounds, identities, needs, and abilities. I believe we in HR need to be focused on building leaders who can drive this evolution and be role models and champions for empathy, authenticity, and transparency.”

In other reading:

  • No More Working for Jerks! (New York Times)

  • How innovative new HR tech can help companies combat the Great Resignation (Fast Company)

  • Rising wages and other US hiring trends to expect in 2022 (Quartz)

  • GreenSpark, a New York City-based digital platform for metal recyclers, raised $5 million in Series A funding. Tiger Global led the round and was joined by Bienville Capital. (Businesswire)

  • Recora Health, a New York City-based healthcare platform for cardiac and heart health, raised $22.4 million in new venture funding.

  • Sesame, a New York City-based commission-free delivery startup for restaurants, raised $3.4 million in a pre-seed funding. Eldridge led the round and was joined by Relish Works and Tuesday Capital. (QSR)

  • January 11: Virtual: 5 Ways to Sharpen Your 2022 Employee Communications, with Lyft senior director of internal communications Denise Bertuccelli. Hosted by Axios. Register here.

  • January 12: Virtual: The Future of Work Summit, with Zoom CTO Brendan Ittelson, Salesforce Service Cloud CEO Clara Shih, Moveworks CEO Bhanvin Shah, and others. Hosted by VentureBeat. Register here.

  • January 25: Virtual: The Future of Community, with Flybridge Capital and Community Fund VC general partner Jesse Middleton. Register here.

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