An office relocation is a large undertaking for any business and in order to make sure it goes as smoothly as possible there is a lot of planning to be done.
It’s a well-known fact that moving home is one of the most stressful experiences a person goes through during adult life, and unfortunately, things don’t get any easier when it comes to business!
From finding a new office first and foremost to hiring a moving company, organizing your staff, packing up the current office and getting all of your assets in order. There’s a lot to do and often timescales can be limited!
As a business, you are likely to have a lot of assets, and whether these be tangible or intangible, it is important that they are kept safe and in order when relocating your workspace to save things from getting lost or broken during the move.
Keeping Business Assets Safe During Relocation
As there are so many different types of assets, we have broken them down along with how you can and should keep them safe during an office move.
Office Furniture
Let’s start with the biggest assets – well in terms of size anyway – furniture such as desks, chairs and bookcases etc. It might be a good idea to store these larger items away until you are ready to move them into the new office.
There are several large storage facilities with which you can take advantage of nowadays, most offer flexible deals on how much storage you can hire and how long for.
By doing this you can save the hassle of shipping everything out in one day, potentially having to make multiple trips back and forth in order to get everything moved quickly. This can be an excruciating process, especially if your new office is a significant distance away from the old!
Check to make sure that you’re happy with the area in which you are storing your furniture and that there is no evidence of leaks or water damage, that could potentially affect your furniture during its time in storage.
Technology
Most businesses are heavily reliant on technology nowadays, which is why making sure that items such as laptops, desktops and other digital equipment are handled very carefully when put into transit.
Whilst it can be cheaper to attempt moving items yourself by hiring a van or calling on the help of a friend, when it comes to transporting expensive cargo like tech, it’s worth considering a professional moving company to aid the process.
These companies can often offer insurance or replacement guarantees for any items accidentally damaged during transit. This will give you peace of mind when it comes to moving day and you literally leave your business operations in the hands of a moving van.
Make sure to use protective packaging material such as bubble wrap to protect any pieces which are of particular importance. When placing them into the moving van, store them in a manner in which they cannot move whilst on the road, and potentially fall and subsequently sustain damage.
Documentation
Paperwork comes part and parcel with working in an office environment. Whether these are invoices, client reports or marketing materials, it’s always surprising just how many documents you can accrue over time.
The first thing to do is to have a good old fashioned sort, to make sure that you’re not moving anything that isn’t necessary. This is great for not only lessening the load of materials that have to be transported but for giving your business a new fresh start in its new surroundings, unchained from any and all unnecessary clutter.
Once this is done, it’s time to carefully sort these documents into a system so they are easily retrievable upon request.
It’s tempting in moving scenarios to throw caution to the window and simply lump things in any order and think about sorting it out at a later date. Unfortunately, by doing this you will be making your life significantly harder down the line.
Use clearly labelled folders, binders and other organizational techniques to split out document forms and types to start your new office off in the organized manner with which it should be.
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