It’s clear to everyone that accommodation expenses are a significant part of the total operating expenses. These costs can easily soar. After all, it’s not just about the price per square metre, but also related costs, such as service costs and facility costs. With all these expenses to worry about, it’s nice when you can save space in your business, so you can use it for your company’s core activities. A few tips to save space (and costs):
Open-plan offices instead of separate spaces
In the old system, employees would often have their own space, but open-plan offices are becoming more regular. The Dutch Health and Safety Act (arbowet) states that each employee should have at least 4m2 (10,75ft2). By creating an open-plan office, you can save a lot of space, since the available space can be divided up much more efficiently. Open-plan offices also offer a number of other advantages, like increased transparency and better communication between employees.
Flexible working
By letting your employees be flexible in their working times, you can save a lot of space, and costs. You can, for instance, give your employees the option of working (partly) from home. You can also let them determine their own schedule. That way, you need fewer workspaces than the number of people you employ. The available workspaces become ‘flexi spaces’ that each employee can use. Fixed workspaces have now become a thing of the past.
Working digitally
A precondition for working flexibly is having information digitally available. Working digitally decreases the amount of paper within an organization and lets you save quite a bit of space in the office. Is your paper pile still growing? Then have those documents digitized. This can be done very easily, for instance with JalemaBox Scan.
External archiving
Still have documents you need to save physically, for instance because of a legal retention period? Then have these documents stored externally, so that your precious office space can be used for your company’s core activities. There are various solutions available for this. Clients with a smaller archive can usually manage with the JalemaBox Storage. For clients with a larger archive, it’s usually more interesting to look at services like the Archiefspecialist.
Fewer printers/copying machines per department
It used to be common practice to have one or even several printers per department. Why not choose to substantially reduce this number and save the space? By placing these machines at the heart of the office, employees are encouraged to move more, and will very likely be less inclined to print anything unnecessary. Consider using a multifunctional device instead of a separate printer, scanner or copying machine. Make use of the office space you have and start applying one or more of these tips today! This will allow you to save a considerable amount of space, and costs, in no time.