Preparing Your Team For An Office Move
Relocating an office—and its team—involves many details and moving parts. Aside from identifying the suitable space and managing other logistics, it’s important to remember the people involved. Change is hard for many individuals. Preparing a team for an office move is a detail no business owner or manager wants to overlook inadvertently. Here are some top tips to minimize disruption and help the team experience a smooth transition.
1. Communicate the Plan
The importance of communication with your employees can’t be understated. Don’t let employees hear through the grapevine the office is relocating. People need to know how this significant change will affect them. Ensure they are informed and learn the details, including location, dates, features of the new facility, and any other pertinent information. A move may affect them in many ways, including commute times, childcare arrangements, cost of commuting, and the decision to relocate with the company (if a long-distance move), along with the stress that sometimes accompanies a need to establish a new routine or work in a different facility.
Pro Tip: Encourage questions about the move—not only will this keep staff informed—they may have questions about moving details that you may have accidentally overlooked.
2. Set Up Teams
Involving employees helps them feel like they are a part of the bigger picture and enables the employer to obtain “buy-in” from their team members. Keep them engaged by setting up teams to manage different tasks associated with the move. This could include making decisions about what should/shouldn’t be moved, notifying customers and clients, setting up utilities, subscriptions, services, etc. This will help ease the transition and simplify the move.
3. Use the Opportunity to Organize, Streamline, and Downsize
Businesses that occupy space for long periods, much like residential households, tend to accumulate a lot of stuff. Moving is a great time to organize, streamline, and downsize your office. Essentially, kick the clutter. Moving excess office equipment, files, and other items means more to pack and pay for. Downsizing is an excellent opportunity to reorganize and reduce moving costs.
4. Offer Incentives and Improvements
A new location offers the business a fresh start. Suppose the office has worn-out furniture, outdated equipment, or technology that severely needs upgrades. Why not consider buying new to allow employees to work under better conditions? Doing so will increase efficiency, productivity, and overall happiness, giving them a boost in morale during what might be a difficult transition.
Pro Tip: Let employees help choose new furniture and survey them about their technology needs and what does/doesn’t work.
5. Hire a Professional Moving Company
Packing and unpacking are time-consuming and involves a lot of physical labor. To help ease the difficulties and stress associated with moving, avoid delegating staff to do this chore on top of everything else. Instead, professional movers can come in, quickly pack up, and have the new office set up when they arrive. Employees will have plenty of immediate tasks to manage when settling in the office’s new location. Avoiding the stress associated with the packing process will help them have an easier transition.
Moving Made Easy
Relocating an office can be complicated. For help with your move, contact us today for a price quote. We’ll survey your company’s needs to help determine which of our services will make your office relocation seamless.
