When we first conceive our startups, the only thing on our minds is how we can reduce the costs of starting a business to maximise our profits early on. As a result, we may cut corners and we may be forced to make difficult decisions that can lead to further complications in the future. Unless we try to remedy these problems at an early stage, they’ll slowly creep up in the future and rear their ugly heads just as we’re on the cusp of success.
Fortunately, some of these problems can be fixed without too much additional investment, and your office is one of those things. When you start up a business, you’re probably thinking about a small office rental that is within your budget and provides all the bare necessities. You might find comfort in your current location and, as a result, you don’t want to move out despite not having much space to work with or hire new employees.
To fix this, there are many little tricks and tips you can utilise in order to make more space. It might take some effort to clean up your office, but it’s much better to spend your personal time than spend money that could’ve otherwise be invested back into your business to make it grow. So without further ado, here is a couple of tips that can help you enlarge your office without ever needing to rent a new place.
Declutter your workplace
It’s common for businesses to become cluttered due to bad employee practices or just neglect. You might even think to yourself that you’re gonna move on from your current location so you have no real reason to worry about clutter because you’ll just hire someone to get rid of it anyway. However, this way of thinking backfires when you realise that you enjoy your current office and you don’t actually want to move away for any reason. In situations like this, it’s best to get your hands dirty and start cleaning up the office so that you have more space for the things that matter.
You can start by getting large refuse bags and asking your employees to throw out anything they don’t need. Important documents should be kept safe in organisers or drawers, and any personal items should be kept safely stored elsewhere during your office spring clean. Throw out any old documents that aren’t needed, get rid of all the trash on the desks of your staff and consider selling or recycling unneeded bits of equipment that have become redundant. For instance, you might have old mice and keyboards laying around that you vowed to fix, or server hardware that has been replaced in the past.
Once you’ve given your office a spring clean, you’ll realise that your desks look a bit cleaner and spacious, perhaps your storage rooms have widened a bit and you generally have a much nicer looking office to work in. The illusion of space is powerful and can contribute to making your office look and feel much larger than it really is. However, it’s also practical because it improves your workplace productivity, there is less clutter to get in the way and you physically have more space as well.
Clean out storage rooms
One of the most common places in an office that is overloaded with useless items is a storage room. For example, you might have a storage room dedicated to paper archives that could easily be sorted, stored or digitised with document storage services. This could free up an entire room to act as another office, or you could have renovations done to knock down the walls and merge it to create larger spaces. You might also have a storage area which is dedicated to old hardware or useless items that haven’t been used for weeks or months. This equipment can easily be sold on a website such as eBay to give your business a bit of extra money and free up much-needed space. In short, storage rooms are essentially useless because unless your business really needs those archived paper records or backup devices, you can clean up all of that useless junk and repurpose that area.
If you storage rooms are too small to be repurposed for another use or knocked down to create a larger room, then you can always store useful items inside that will actually see some use. For instance, you could have a small storage room dedicated to cleaning supplies or office equipment such as stacks of paper, pens and pencils. It’s all about optimising your space and trying to make the use out of every nook and cranny that you have in your workplace.
Knock some walls down and lower the cubicles
If you really want to add some more space to your office, then you can’t go wrong with knocking down useless walls and merging rooms. It might be a little costly and your staff will need to relocate while the works are being done, but you could create a lot of extra space for new employees and desks by simply knocking down walls and merging rooms into one. A large open-plan office also creates the illusion of more space when combined with low or cubicle walls. If you want to go even further, you could completely remove cubicle walls so that your employees aren’t separated, but this might promote distractions during work.
The more walls there are in your workplace, the more cramped it will feel. If you only need those walls for the sake of dividing up the office, then consider thinning them or install glass partitions so that the illusion of extra space is kept and it doesn’t make you feel cramped. This might be costly, but it’s far more cost efficient than renting a new workplace, which comes with a tonne of extra problems such as keeping employees and moving all of your equipment. If you’re serious about improving your current office and expanding the available space, then consider some office renovations and knock a few walls down!
