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Whether you are a startup business that just got cozy with a new office, or a long-time business owner who had been keeping a respectable company throughout the years, maximizing your office space is always a vital part for your employees’ day to day convenience and productivity.
More often than not, a clean, well-lighted, and spacious work space can inspire employees to work more efficiently and productively compared to a cluttered, noisy and cramped work area.
The money spent for getting an office space is not a joke. Our friends over at www.findmyworkspace.com share 7 amazing tips on how you can maximize the office space you get to improve your business success.
And it’s not just about your employees per se, a good office space will also give visiting clients, partners and even potential employees a very good impression of your company.
The reality however is that many companies, in an effort to maintain low operating expenses, office spaces are maximized by giving each worker a tiny cubicle space. In fact, a recent study showed that employers could only give an average of 151 sq. ft as personal space for workers in the cities.
As much as possible, you as a business owner should avoid this. Remember, your employees also need some space to breathe from time to time. But how can you possibly keep the right number of employees without compromising office space and current rental costs? Below are seven tips that can help you out:
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Clear up filed papers and other stock documents.
Tons of documents and papers can take up significant space – especially with storage cabinets and drawers. So once you get rid of these effects, you can also do away with those large and bulky storage equipment.
But what about very important papers? Try to organize your files first – those that have outlasted their importance should already be shredded, while those that are still useful can be backed up with a digital file (use the cloud!). As much as possible, just leave the documents that are very important, like confidential contracts and other company papers. The aim is to lessen the clutter and make way for more usable space, and not just large filing cabinets.
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Let in more natural lighting.
An office usually feels dull and damp without proper lighting, and it could hamper the productivity of your employees. Natural light can brighten up any room, including an office – plus it highlights white space. Artificial lighting is also okay, but it usually strains the eyes of employees when exposed to it all day long.
The trick is to let in more light during the first few hours of the morning and in the afternoon – when the sun is not too hot. You can then cover up your windows when the sun becomes too glaring. And if the weather is fair and cloudy, you can use up all that natural light all day long.
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Assign co-working areas within your office.
If you can’t clear up some of the cubicle spaces in your office, you must at least provide a common room where employees can opt to work for a few hours – just so they can take time to breathe and freshen their minds with a new and more open environment before going back to their cubicle.
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Implement flexible working hours for your team.
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One way to lessen the number of people that works in your office during certain hours of the day is to offer your employees with flexible working hours. Once there are lesser people in the office, you can of course do away with numerous desks and cubicles that take up too much space and convert it to common workspaces or meeting areas.
There are many ways to implement flexible working hours, some companies allow employees to work from home on certain days of a week, offer part-time hours where some are only required to go in the morning and some in the afternoon, or open up the office from say, 7 a.m. to 12 a.m. where some can go around 7 a.m. up to 3 p.m., while some can clock in after 3 p.m. and onwards (this could actually work especially if you have employees who are night owls).
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As much as possible, use only light and highly mobile equipment.
Forget bulky desktop PCs, just make use of laptops, netbooks or even tablets whenever needed. This would however depend on the type of employees that you hire – if you have graphic designers working for you, then you really need to make use of PCs. For employees however who do mostly clerical work or typing work, there’s no need for a high-powered PCs that can take up too much space and introduce wiring clutter.
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Try to get interior design inspirations online.
There are a lot of Pinterest posts that you can draw inspiration from. There are a number of wall shelf ideas that can certainly work in office spaces that still need to preserve documents and papers. There are also a number of desk storage ideas that can help your employees organize their stuff.
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For startups, limit your employee number.
A growing startup business could be pretty exciting, and most startup CEOs make the mistake of hiring too many people that are not really needed in the first place – this actually creates a lot of problems. Not just in the sense of office spacing, but also in redundancy, management, and funding issues.
However, our main issue here is how it could affect the office space. When you hire three people who can do the job of only one, then there is a significant waste of space there as you need to make room for all of them. So just take it easy. Getting over-excited is normal, but make sure to temper it out and consult with your co-founders first before taking any action in the hiring process.
Before anything else, the first thing you should do to maximize office space is to get rid of stuff that are not needed anymore. Schedule a sort of “spring cleaning” for your company and maintain the activity every quarter so your employees will also have the opportunity to classify and get rid of papers and things that only waste space.
Author Bio:
Gemma Reeves
Gemma Reeves is a seasoned writer who enjoys creating helpful articles and interesting stories. She has worked with several clients across different industries such as advertising, online marketing, technology, healthcare, family matters, and more. She is also an aspiring entrepreneur who is engaged in assisting other aspiring entrepreneurs in finding the best office space for their business.
Check out her company here: FindMyWorkspace
March 6, 2017
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