Over the last two years, the food industry has been put to the ultimate agility test. The effects of COVID-19 have placed incredible strain on food companies, their overall operations and their employees. As food companies have worked to respond to and manage COVID-19, much of the responsibility for these initiatives, in many companies, has been placed on food safety professionals. This included the development and implementation of a wide range of complex and ever-evolving COVID policies, interwoven with or layered over existing programs.
As these programs have been put into place, the daily responsibilities of company leadership, management and their employees have changed as well. Whereas the primary focus of food safety departments pre-COVID was exclusively on food safety and quality, the focus shifted heavily post-COVID to management of the virus and related programs.