It’s time to move to a new office. Moving to Salt Lake City to play with the big boys is an exciting idea. You started with ten people. After just two years, you now have more than 40 employees.
Business is growing, with more account sign-ups and new products being developed. Building the company means growing your staff to respond to the increasing demand from customers and operations.
Your cramped headquarters is now filled with unhappy and grumpy employees. Your furniture sets are overused and in need of replacement. The grievance list in HR is getting longer by the week. You cannot afford this!
What can you do? You can be overwhelmed by the 10 to 15 items on your to-do list related to moving to a new location. Or you can focus on a few key areas.
Establish a Committee
Let’s skip the planning part. Many of the items discussed here will, in some form or other, fall under the big heading called “planning.”
Set up a committee to oversee the entire relocation operation. It doesn’t matter if it’s a one-person committee or a committee composed of several persons.
One word to keep in mind: coordination. You need a committee to coordinate everything, from contacting an interior design company to negotiating with professional movers. With proper committee leadership, you avoid straining your operation by having key people perform unnecessary tasks. Some people in the company will be able to spare time to contribute to the move. But some you can’t take away from their day to day tasks. The business might fold! You know which ones they are.
With a committee, you will have the ability to delegate and categorize tasks. The delegation is done by forming sub-committees, and these sub-committees will oversee all the planning, legwork, and information dissemination. A finance/budget committee, for example, will gather and analyze information related to the cost of the move. What percentage of the annual budget should be allocated for all the expenses?
A building search sub-committee will be responsible for scouting for the best location. Will the building be easily accessible for the majority of the employees via public transport? Are the candidate buildings seismic code compliant?
You get the picture. Coordination means organization, and you can organize the work based on streams that make sense for you.
Dealing with Team Demands
Coordination means informing everyone in the company on time about your progress. The committee must also gather information and ideas, at least from the different team heads. This might not apply to companies with thousands of employees. But if you’re a small to medium-sized one, this is important.
Your marketing team wants flat-screen TVs to review their marketing videos. Your IT team wants an agile working environment. Your researchers wish to have a sound-absorbing desk system.
Chances are, you can’t give all of them what they want. You’re not yet Google or Microsoft. Communicate with team leads and present what’s available. Pursue a negotiation strategy where everyone will be happy. Dealing with disgruntled colleagues is an unnecessary aggravation just because you missed the opportunity to communicate.
Hire the Experts
This would depend on what the finance sub-committee would say. But you would at least need to hire professional movers. Thirty-eight percent of corporations that move employ the services of a moving company. The recommendation is to canvass for the best service providers and to get at least three proposals.
Focusing on these critical areas will help you deal with the many items in-between and properly conclude your relocation efforts.
