You’ve got a business to run. And now you’ve got to run it while you’re moving it from one location to another! How do you keep your Dallas business growing and the profits flowing while your furniture’s going out the door? That’s the “million dollar” question of office relocation! Answer it inappropriately, and your productivity and profits will go out the door with the furniture.
At A-1 Freeman Moving Group, we’ve got a right answer for you – one that can help you stay clear of 8 gaffes that we, as
office relocation specialists, find all too often made:
- Not Planning Ahead. As soon as you know you’ve got to move, that’s when you should get down to planning for it. Unfortunately, too many firms begin their office relocation planning a little too late. Too late for what, you ask? Well, too late for moving companies and other suppliers to come up with a decent proposal for you, let alone properly deliver the goods and services you purchase from them. Keep in mind: too little time often leads to too many mistakes. Let the size of your firm and the complexity of your move – i.e., the number of tasks that must be performed before other tasks can be begun – guide you in deciding how soon is soon enough.
- Not Vetting Your Mover Properly. Office relocations are tricky. You need a moving company that understands how to handle office furniture and modular systems, computer systems and networking, office equipment, machinery, and hardware, cabling, phone systems, security systems, building permits, and ... that’s just looking into, make sure they’re legitimate. Check https://ai.fmcsa.dot.gove/hhg/search.asp to see, first of all, that they’re U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) licensed and insured, particularly for interstate commerce. Examine the reviews at bbb.org. to see if any grievances have been entered against them with the Better Business Bureau. And, if you can, speak with other companies who’ve employed them to see how well they satisfied their contractual duties. It’s also wise to ask about their moving crews – whether they’re full-time employees or temps, whether they’ve been background checked and drug tested, and whether they observe standard chain-of-custody procedures.
- Not Coordinating and Communicating Sufficiently with Your Mover. Your office relocation manager must work with the project manager your moving company has allocated to ensure that your internal team and the moving company’s team are on the same page. Any changes to the schedule must be properly relayed to all those involved, so that one problem doesn’t give rise to all kinds of glitches and cost overruns.
Not Assigning Enough Internal Staff to Your Move. The scope of any office relocation pretty much mandates that you call on the help of employees from within your firm. Pick people in each department who understand their department’s needs fully and have access to applicable company records. That might not always be the department head! In fact, you’re often better off getting the help of seasoned but non-managerial staffers, as they’re more likely to follow your relocation manager’s dictates without argument.- Not Keeping to Schedule. It’s seldom the case that an office relocation schedule loses speed. Certainly, various steps can be held up for this or that reason. But what usually happens then is that the schedule is compressed. And that usually happens because the planning got started too late. And what happens when you try to compensate for lost time? More people from your team and the mover’s team are stuck with more overtime hours. Everybody starts getting in everybody else’s way. Things get messy. Mistakes are made. And who pays for all this? Yep. Better to establish a rational schedule at the start and adhere to it.
- Not Budgeting Enough for Your Move. Admittedly, it’s difficult for any company that hasn’t gone through a relocation before to know just what its move will wind up costing. To leave that cost to a roll of the dice, though, or to budget for it inadequately is a huge mistake! At the outset, you must budget for recurring real-estate costs, soft-dollar expenses for, say, employee relocation and training, capital expenses such as new furniture and office equipment purchases, moving expenses, and consulting expenses for such things perhaps as interior design and engineering. The more of your needs you give a thought to at the start, the more manageable the expense of your office relocation will be.
- Not Having Sufficient Coverage. If you’ve decided to sign with a professional relocation company of any recognition, the potential for property damage is small. Still, you must be prepared. Consult your mover about the coverage options they offer and select the one that seems most right for your business.
- Not Thinking to Back Up Your Data. No need for horror stories here. Suffice it to say that when your office relocation is underway, your business’s material records ought to be backed up digitally, wherever doable. Those that can’t be digitized should be deposited safely in a warehouse. And your digital data ought to be backed up in the cloud. As a matter of record, losing such data or suffering its vandalism isn’t a common phenomenon. But do you really want to risk it? Then, for goodness’ sake, back it up!
A big way to circumvent these sorts of mistakes – or to offset them effectively – is to hire a moving company that has a proven track record of successful office relocations. May we propose A-1 Freeman Moving Group right here in Dallas? Look into our credentials as we suggest above. Then look over our
office relocation services and ...
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