How iFood takes care of people in this year of a pandemic

Working with Health and Safety means dedicating yourself every day to caring for people. So, I think any professional can imagine what it was like to be part of an EHS area at a time when, suddenly, the world stopped to face a pandemic.
In March 2020, when the world almost stopped, iFood soon understood that keeping people well would be their priority. Thus, the Health and Safety Team (EHS) had the challenge of keeping all Foodlovers safe in their homes after deciding on the home office. We knew that the removal of colleagues, leaders and the office environment, in addition to the concern with the pandemic itself, would have consequences for emotional health, not only for Foodlover, but also for their families. At the beginning of the crisis, they made over 100 calls in one day to find out how FoodLovers were doing.

It was in this context that iFOS beta emerged, the set of iFood initiatives that determined their way of working remotely and also, of course, taking care of people, with flexibility, freedom, focus on deliveries and with an eye on the development and balance of each FoodLover.

IFOS is divided into 3 pillars:

Balance: iCare, Healthy Teams, Real Holidays and Temperature Measurement;
Development: Quarterly Development and Remote Leadership;
Connection: 100% Remote, Communication and Connection, Remote Work Guide 2.0 and Speaking the Same Language.
In this article we will talk about the Equilibrium pillar, focused on iCare, our Health and Wellness program. Below, I tell you about our main initiatives:

COVID Assistance Protocol: our first major objective was to assist all those with any type of COVID symptom. At that moment, we implemented a robust testing protocol for FoodLovers and family members, with daily monitoring, with nurses and doctors, leaving them reassured that they would have quality support to get through this moment. Today, more than 1,500 COVID tests are performed and more than 7,600 follow-up calls are made.

Online psychotherapy: the second action we implemented was a partnership with an online psychotherapy platform, offering FoodLovers and their families totally free care and the opportunity to choose from more than 300 psychologists from different lines of action. The adherence of Foodlovers is demonstrated by the numbers and feedbacks, more than 7,800 consultations have been carried out and many thanks.

Psychologist a slack away: we offer a psychologist who is available all day on our internal communication tool, Slack. That way, Foodlover does not need to wait for an appointment to vent, ask for help, or even tell about a question from a family member, for example. The psychologist acts as a “co-worker” who listens and helps, but who is qualified and able to point out ways to reduce their suffering and anguish. Of course, it goes without saying that these processes and information are completely confidential.

Emotional Health Committee: we have implemented an emotional health committee to treat more serious cases of mental health. Composed of HR, leadership, family doctor, occupational physician, psychologists, psychiatrists and psychopedagogues, the Committee is called whenever we detect a sensitive case or when we are called by the leader or HR. We use the expertise of each member to understand the cases and give all necessary assistance to the Foodlover or family member.

Information is never too much: throughout the year, we brought a lot of content about health and well-being, with several videos and lives on the topic. Mariana Ferrão spoke about food and sleep quality. Monja Coen brought meditation content and emotional balance. Dr. Jairo Bouer spoke about emotional illnesses, among other content produced by iFood’s own Health area. A few days ago, we brought Dr. Ana Escobar talking about the new scenario of COVID.

Balance and Health Week: in November last year, we dedicated an entire week to the topic. There were several contents around the theme “your balance matters”. We talked about emotions generated by isolation, strategies to deal with the period and we had the participation of Dr. Dráuzio Varela to talk about the pandemic, its consequences, and especially to demystify emotional illnesses.

Zen moment, a break to breathe: we offer weekly and periodic training on meditation tools. The last training session included 140 Foodlovers and lasted 8 weeks talking about Mindfulness.

Scientific research on emotional health: much more than providing assistance in a difficult time, we want to know what impacts the health and well-being of our employees. We have partnered with an Organizational Neuroscience company that helps us understand what are the main possible causes of stress and anxiety. Thus, we are more assertive to implement targeted actions, creating and maintaining an increasingly healthy emotional environment for everyone.

Emotional Health Screening: in November we ran an emotional health screening to identify cases of depression, anxiety and stress. This action was intended to identify who might be going through an emotionally delicate time and perhaps was not even realizing it. This survey identified more than 100 foodlovers who were at a high level of emotional stress. All of them received support even closer to our team.

#TamoJuntas against domestic violence: we know that, with isolation, domestic violence has grown in Brazil. We realized that we needed to prepare ourselves to accommodate this type of case. We understand that empathy, welcoming and serority are essential for the moment. Then #TamoJuntas was born, an exclusive project for FoodLovers, to provide information about abusive or toxic relationships. We offer self-awareness training, BOT assistance and psychological support. If a Foodlover realizes that it needs support, send a #tamojuntas in a Whatsapp number that request for help is directed to our Health area so that all guidance is provided.

IFood Challenge: the iFood Challenge is a program that encourages Foodlover to practice physical activities, forming groups with colleagues, interacting and competing. 30 to 40 minutes of activity points are converted and the team that accumulates the highest score wins. More than 11,000 hours of physical activity have been completed, 43,000 km traveled and 40,000 reais donated to the NGO Cruzando Histórias

What about food? The pandemic scenario brought another ingredient: taking better care of how we eat. The short time, the routine of taking care of the home and family accentuated problems of poor diet. In this scenario, we provide personalized assistance for the construction of a food program for Foodlovers. We have partnered with a platform that provides trained nutritionists to understand the objectives of each Foodlover and set up a balanced and specific diet. That was how Nutricare was born, which today has served more than 1,000 Foodlovers.

My iFood corner: We provide subsidies for our FoodLovers to create the #HomeOffice corner, equipped with chairs, headsets, mice, tables and everything they need. There were about 1425 FoodLovers impacts and 5,600 items provided.