Turn Moving your Business into an Opportunity
Even if you are only moving to another floor in your building, the thought of relocating probably sounds about as appealing as going totally without carbs for a week.
After all, moving your business is widely considered one of the single-most stressful life events for a business owner. Add to that the prospect of losing valuable work time, and you can understand why business owners try to get out of town when the business remodels, relocates or redecorates.
"I have always been scheduled to be out of town for the day before, day of, and day after moving day," says Hirschfeld, the managing partner of a real-estate company in Westport, Connecticut. "Simply put, less is more." Leaving the office entirely is, of course, only one way of handling a relocation - stepping aside and letting the movers and your IT Firm do their thing. But how do you keep your business productive even when your office is in pieces?
So here are the key things I have learned about how to make a move with a minimum of down time:
- It's impossible to plan too far ahead. If it's a minor move, then you should know in advance where the cubicles will get set up and where the Ethernet connections will get wired through and even how much power you need for your servers. Leave nothing to chance. Relocating an entire business also means moving a local-area network or a wireless network, numerous PCs and printers. It can mean shipping equipment and inventory. Line up your proverbial ducks well in advance of the big day.
Tip: With careful planning, and depending on the size of your business, you can ensure that the actual move happens over a weekend. That gives you enough time to install and troubleshoot any technology that has migrated. If there's any down-time, it will be on Sunday and Monday, minimizing the impact to your staff, clients and customers. - Be prepared for the unexpected. A move of any kind forces you to think on your feet, to be ready for anything. If you travel frequently, you probably already know how to do that. For example: Where do you go to buy a box of Cat6 wire at 1 a.m. What if you need to make copies, but don't have any of your machines set up? It forces you to take nothing for granted, even little things like power and phone service.
Tip: Request CSSD’s 63-Step checklist to help ensure nothing gets overlooked. - Use the move as an excuse to upgrade. For example, if your office is using bulky CRT monitors (yes, they still exist), here's the perfect reason to donate those clunkers to your favorite charity and buy flat-panel monitors. It's also a good opportunity to take a hard look at the software you're using to see if it needs updating (I just upgraded a client from SBS 2003 to SBS2011). Basically, you want to arrive at your new office location in even better shape to do business than you were when you left.
Tip: Use your laptop computers as "interim" office machines while you're in transit. In other words, make sure they're all synched up and have the latest software before you begin your move. Then, use them as your primary PCs while your new office gets situated. - Anticipate down time, even if you expect none. Delays happen. "I recommend clients notify their clients, associates and friends in advance, via e-mail or phone, that their availability will be somewhat limited for a day or two," says Johannes Banck, owner of CSSD.
Tip: Consider asking employees to work remotely for a few days. Technology exists as part of a disaster recovery setup to virtualize existing servers while the main server is down. - Let your applications help you "move." If your relocation also involves an upgrade or migrating to new hardware (and as I just mentioned, this is an excellent opportunity to upgrade), make sure your programs do the heavy lifting. Save all of your old user options and migrate them to the new hardware or software, so that once you arrive in your new digs, you'll be able to get to work right away.
Tip: The trickiest of the migrations tends to be moving e-mail from one PC to the next. Exchange and Office365 do away with those pesky .PSD files.
Computer Systems Support & Design brings the right set of skills and experience to the table and your server room to make your move as painless and efficient as possible.
With a little planning and shrewd use of your existing technology, you can make sure that your move will be as painless -- and productive -- as possible. But I can't lie to you: Moving is still stressful. Yet hopefully, with these tips, and our help it'll be a little less so.
Johannes Banck, SBSC
(203) 348-8047 Ext 211
About Computer Systems Support & Design, LLC: In 2001 CSSD’s President, Johannes Banck, recognized the need to do more with less in the SMB market. Since that time CSSD has been creating business efficiencies through technology for companies in Fairfield County, Connecticut.
CSSD provides a full array of IT services for Fairfield County, Connecticut based small and medium sized businesses.
These services include:
- Pro-active On-Site Services - pro-active effort with reactive resources
- CSSD's One Day Technology Analysis - a review with a new perspective
- Strategic Consulting - analysis, planning, and application selection
- Server room and network implementations
- Hosted Exchange, Office 365 & SharePoint
- Spam and Virus Filtering - scrubbing your email before it reaches your network
- Security Scanning - Weekly security testing service
- System Monitoring - Windows, Unix, and Linux monitoring service
- Disaster Recovery and Backup
