Running an office successfully more than just assigning tasks. Offices, like most other communal spaces, generate a social environment that requires tailored management practices.
Office management has benefitted greatly from recent technological advances. In a lot of ways, office management tools are better now than they’ve ever been. The challenge is in getting out of them to keep things in order. Use the office management tips described here to keep your office in top shape.
Make out of Your Office Space
There are two facets to a well-organised office.
The first is an efficient use of space that eliminates waste and clutter, and streamlines interactions. That means things like having easily accessible filing cabinets and having teams that work together in roughly the same place. Direct communication is vital and being able to interact face to face always expedites projects.
The second important facet is creating a space that is both motivating and comfortable. After all, you and your employees spend a lot of time in that office. An environment that’s bare and utilitarian isn’t very motivating.
Productive work starts with good office management. Best practices include, but are certainly not limited to, creating enough room for people to move around freely and providing proper lighting. Studies show that dynamic lighting can be a valuable office management tool to increase performance.
If you’re in the planning phase, something like SmartDraw’s Office Layout Planner is an excellent tool to optimise the use of space. With a layout planner, you can have easy access to building plans. You can also customise them on the fly as your needs change.
Create Communication Channels
Communication is essential for the proper functioning of any organisation. Office management can be construed as equal parts establishing a work environment and establishing ways to communicate in it. In terms of office management importance, communication ranks near the very top.
As the leader, your employees should have access to you. Moreover, every member of the office should be able to communicate freely with his or her peers.
Make a habit of checking in with everyone periodically. It reinforces the fact that you’re open to communication and can potentially uncover problems in work dynamics. Even if you can’t help directly with a problem, you will be able to arrange for the right people to get in touch.
Many companies and organisations handle office management responsibilities via Slack. It’s likely a platform that you’ve already heard about and may as well be using. Slack is a powerful collaboration platform that essentially creates a chat room for employees, allowing them to communicate and exchange files.
Make Expectations Clear
Everyone in the office is a link in a chain, and no link is more important than the next.
In an office, a person who is uncertain about their responsibilities can create a bottleneck that disrupts the entire workflow. Therefore, delegating tasks appropriately and going over everyone’s role is crucial.
The whole point of having a workforce and an office is to extract value out of that arrangement. If some members are pulling significantly more weight than the others, it defeats the purpose. One-on-one meetings with employees to see if there are any problem areas or things they are uncertain about are a powerful tool that should be used sparingly.
Dropbox Paper is a powerful management and collaboration tool that can help with task assignment duties. It functions as a virtual bulletin board of sorts where tasks and assignments can be clearly managed for all members. People on the same assignment can comment, check off done tasks, and consult with each other, all on Paper.
Look for Opportunities to Optimise
There is always a better way to do something. That’s truer for offices than probably any other environment. The hardest thing about managing an office is recognizing all those potential improvements.
The concept of Gemba Kaizen took the organisational world by storm in the 80s and 90s, and it remains just as applicable today. Set aside time to assess your office objectively.
Observe workflows and ask yourself where adjustments can be made. Maybe you could improve the way tasks are assigned or there’s a project deadline that is too far or too near. Any small improvement can have a big impact on the overall performance.
Your best tools for performing continuous improvement are thinking outside the box and keeping your eyes peeled.
Managing an Office Is Managing People
At the end of the day, every part of office management is about making it as easy as possible for the people working in it to do their jobs. It doesn’t have to be any more complicated than that.
When trying to get out of your office, start with the physical space. Make sure it’s both pleasing to the senses and functional. Then move on to more efficiency-oriented things such as communication strategies and task delegation. Finally, remember that your work is never over. There is always a little tweak or improvement to be done here and there.