Whether you’re the business owner or responsible for conducting  the research, organisation is key when it comes to planning an office refurbishment. We look at the preparatory steps you can undertake to become the most organised office renovation planner possible and ensure everything goes off smoothly.

 

Conduct Pre-Planning Planning

Ascertain preliminary budget figures and ideal spend amounts. It would be wise to also agree an absolute maximum spend, internally.

At this stage, set a final completion date and flesh out some preliminary end goals by asking these questions; do we want a full office refurbishment or a partial renovation? Do we need to make any changes to the IT & Communication infrastructure? Is  a full office refurbishment our best option, or might we need to move premises in the coming years? How much new furniture will we need?

Also, now is a good time to get yours and the company’s heads around the timings involved with an office refurbishment.

 

Evaluate Core Needs

What is the central reason for renovating your office? Is it because it is simply due a decoration or do you want to increase productivity?

It will be well worth your while having a read of this excellent article from the Harvard Business Review titled ‘Workspaces That Move People’. In it, Waber et al discuss the statistical evidence that supports the productivity benefits that a well-redesigned office can bring to a company.

Are you looking to increase collaborations, ad-hoc interactions and improve morale? Or are you looking to make room for more staff as your business grows? Or both?

Decide what you are trying to achieve from your office refurbishment and then speak to a professional management company who can perform an assessment and advise on how to achieve your goals.

 

Plan Thoroughly

Once you have engaged at least one management company to price the works and help you schedule the timings, you also need to conduct planning internally.

We have covered a few angles in earlier blog posts on the topic, but you need to ensure that you have prepared staff, the premises, suppliers, clients and your budgets for the upcoming work.

It would be advisable to have individuals reporting to one accountable person who can oversee the project as a whole.

 

Allocate Time and Assign Responsibilities

Leading on from this, is the idea of also allocating time as well as responsibilities. Keeping a focused control on timescales and deadlines will ensure that the refurbishment can take place as efficiently as possible, which is important because it is likely that  productivity of your business might be hampered during the works.

 

Speak To The Professionals Throughout The Process

Engaging with the experts will ensure that you don’t miss any vital areas and can also plan your budget and manage costs from the outset.

Some businesses are tempted to manage their office refurbishment themselves but then find trying to effectively cost plan, manage a range of sub-contractors, handle multiple tenders  and ensuring there are no gaps in the Scopes of Works can soon become a full time role.

The potential cost of missing vital elements from a contractor’s allocated work or not being able to achieve a fair price (through ineffective tendering) are risks which are all negated when employing a fully inclusive contractor to manage the project on your behalf.

 

Use The Checklist

The first step to ensuring you’re the most organised office renovation planner possible was reading this blog post. The second is downloading the completely FREE checklist now, which allows you to see the whole range of what you need to plan and be able to assign tasks and deadlines to make sure everything is completed in as efficiently as possible.