Moving an entire office to a different place is a daunting task in itself. Although it’s not an easy task, planning before, during and after office move can make office relocation smooth and efficient. Here is a good moving checklist to help you:
Come up with an office relocation plan beforehand
You must have a relocation plan beforehand. Rushing can be highly risky here! There are certain indicators that you should monitor in your office move plan.
These include:
- Logistics factors: Try to assess certain factors that are related to the overall satisfaction of both clients and employees.
- Brand factor: You must focus on brand appropriateness. For this, you need to watch out how the neighborhood is developing. These developments should reflect your brand reputation.
- Lease contract: You might need your moving plan at the time of deciding to renovate your office. Keep in mind that your leasing agreement usually prevents you from making changes.
- Market pressure: This is the most vital office relocation factor. You might need to draft your business development and expansion strategy.
Try to prepare a good list of considerations that are related to finding an ideal office location. The choice of the location is usually based on your requirements. After all, every business has different needs.
Look for a broker
Once you have takenevery factor into consideration, you must start looking for a reliable broker. Certain times, you can go for a good office location yourselves. However, the process can be pretty time-taking. There are certain landlords who work only with real estate brokers.
Try to discuss the new office location with your stakeholder. This way you will need a broker who is able to present many locations to choose from. Keep in mind that not every location is created equal. Also, not all of the available options will suit into the very same budget. This way you might want to have a big list of certain office moves.
Arrange stuff for new office
You certainly need a lot of things in your new office. Make a list, first.The new office must address your major business-related needs. You must take your time and make a relocation plan. It must consist of all positive and negative points of the current place as well as the planned new location.
Create an office relocation checklist in Excel. You can then compare the advantages and disadvantages of both locations.
Try to assess all your current expenditures. You must compare them against the new office location. All the services you need to run your business need to be taken into account. You can put them on the list to check how the new place compares to your current services infrastructure.
Fix the budget
Make sure you have a budget in place. On a basic level, it must have all the current costs and costs in the new location. The costs might be lower or higher in the new office. You can decide whether the expenditures are defendable from a business perspective.You will have to plan for the relocation expenses as well. Some are one-time expenditures. Yet, you will have to include all in your plan.Some of these costs include:
- Moving of office furniture
- Costs for a professional moving service
- Losses incurred due to downtime during the move
- Costs for backing up business operations
If your office is too large, it might require a good deal of team effort to move it. You can also hire a team of professional business movers. A good deal of employee communication has to be there.The move needs to be highly coordinated. The furniture selection has to be done properly. The specialty areas need to be well-tested and designed.
Look into the timeline for office move
When you have already selected your new place, you will have your office relocation checklist to move each and every piece of equipment to the new office. First, you will have to move the non-essential office items. One othertop practice is to have all your boxes labeled prior to the move.
You must finalize lease for new location. Notify your landlord of termination date. Advise staff of date of move. Try to engage designer for new premises.
Here is a short list of thebasic steps to make before move:
- Reserve elevators and loading docks
- Bid moving contract
- Bid telephone and computer cabling
- Create inventory of existing furniture
- Try to code furniture and equipment on a floor plan
- Make sure to audit keys
- Order any new office furniture
- Order new stationery
- Try to file forms for address change
- Make sure to check your insurance coverage for the move
- Collect the Certificate of Occupancy
- Try to advise suppliers of new address
- Make sure to alert photocopier contractor
- Decide on security procedures
- Focus on mailing moving notices
- Make sure to schedule public relations effort. These include plans for news releases.
- Make sure to arrange for listing on lobby directory of new building
- Arrange for cleaning after move
Here are some basic steps that you will have to take on the moving day:
- Try to allocate a budget for refreshments for the moving team
- Make sure that all tech equipment, computers, phones etc. are moved first
- All color-coded items should be placed in the proper locations
- All desks must be in the right places along with their numbered boxes
Here are a few steps that you might have to take after moving:
- Try to distribute new telephone lists
- Perform an in-depth check of the premises
- Try to report any damage to the moving company if required
- Ensure your insurance has been transferred
- Ensure old leases have been wrapped up
- Confirm deposits have been received from the old premises
- Try to collect all passes, keycards and keys for your old premises
- Try to hand out new passes, keycards and keys
- Try to check all invoices and payments
- Make sure to arrange for installation of new IT systems
- Try to fix the change of address mailing list and send
- Establish a committee to plan an office-warming
- Go for a client announcement
