How to Move Offices Without Losing Productivity

Moving offices is a major challenge for any business, presenting countless obstacles and headaches along the way. One of the biggest speed bumps faced by managers is how to maintain productivity amidst all the disruption. Thankfully, there are a number of things you can do before and during your move to ensure it goes as seamlessly as possible and keep productivity at an all-time high.

Get employees excited about the move

Keeping employee morale high is the number one way to keep the whole team functioning smoothly. In order to do this, get the team excited about the big move and eager to go through with it. Studies have shown that even in scenarios where change is acknowledged as a good thing, employees can still lose their excitement due to the loss of control, uncertainty and added work relating to relocating. This means that you’ll have to work twice as hard to ensure that the change is welcomed by your team instead of dreaded.

Keep spirits high by focusing on the benefits of the move, such as better amenities, more space or improved aesthetics. Once your employees are as excited about the move as you are, they’ll be more than happy to cop some inconveniences in the process.

Communicate, communicate, communicate

Nothing will dampen the mood among your team more than confusion and unclarity, leading to a drop in productivity. When people don’t know what is going on around them, they’ll find it incredibly hard to put their heart into their work.

Keep the lines of communication wide open so that everyone is informed and clear about what is happening. Be open to communicating with all your employees, both collectively and individually, to ensure everyone has a sense of purpose and understands the reasoning behind the move.

You will also need to communicate with service providers and suppliers to maintain the productivity of your office. The last thing you want is essential office supplies to be delivered to your old address, or for your new premises to not have electricity or Internet because you failed to communicate with your utilities provider. Ensure you hit the ground running at your new premises by communicating with all relevant entities well before the move.

Move departments in stages

Many businesses will try to complete their entire move in one day, but when you think about it, all this does is put pressure on your whole team while also wiping out a whole day of work. Instead, try breaking up the moving process across several days, moving both equipment and people in order from least critical to most critical. You can also try to divide the departments themselves across your move so that while one half is settling into the new office, the other half is still working away in the old office.

Prioritise IT

Perhaps the most indispensable aspect of any business are the computers and electronics. If your IT isn’t front of mind during your move, you’ll be sure to lose hours of productivity.

A specialist relocation company can properly disconnect and reconnect cables and equipment, ensure everything is moved safely and get everything up and running right away. If you can, try moving on a weekend so all IT equipment can be tested and ready to go come Monday morning.

Utilise temporary telecommuting

Just because your physical office is currently home to a pile of cardboard boxes doesn’t mean your team can’t stay productive. Technology allows for your team to get plenty of work done from home, with tools like Skype, Asana, Slack, Trello and more making this easier than ever. Just make sure you prepare for this ahead of time so that everyone has the resources they need to get work done from home.

Moving offices is an exciting time of growth, and should be celebrated instead of marred by a loss in productivity. By keeping morale high, communicating, moving in stages, prioritising IT and telecommuting, you can ensure productivity remains high and your move to better pastures is seamless.