Shireburn Software employees are back in their offices after successfully carrying out a drill on Thursday 5th March.

“Instead of battling the usual traffic to get to work, our team was busy carrying out a well-orchestrated drill, working remotely for the day!

“This exercise was planned out by our tech team & carried out without warning, to simulate reality as close as possible,” Shireburn Software said in a social media post.

It said that the exercise was carried out “in order to ensure the smooth running of our operations in the event of an actual crisis whereby the team would not be able to get to [their] Skyparks office for whatever reason”.

Shireburn Software commended its team for the successful drill:

“Our team rose to the challenge – in their pyjamas. All operations were fully carried out as per usual, due to the complex remote access systems & security that our technology uses, providing a virtual office for business continuity.”

Adam Buttigieg, Shireburn’s Head of Customer Service & IT, said:

“Whilst the development team continued to work on projects using our online systems, the customer support team redirected all incoming communication through their own cloud based system, ensuring none of our customers are left unsupported in a time of crisis & regardless of many external factors.”

The software company is not the only organisation to be taking measures to prepare themselves for disruptions, with a number of local gaming companies changing policy by asking employees to take their laptops and devices home with them each day, in the event that they cannot make it to the office.

While Shireburn Software made no mention about the current Coronavirus outbreak, which is yet to officially have reached Malta, there have been fears on the outcome on local businesses should the virus spread to the island and precipitate a lockdown.