We Moved Office! Here’s What We Learned…
In May 2017, AuditComply moved into their new home, located in Alexander House, Belfast. An office space that would induce office envy anywhere. All of us were excited to spend the next few years doing amazing things in an amazing office. However, not everything went to plan, but in a spectacular way!
Due to the rapid growth of AuditComply, we had to move office again! In November 2018, we made the move into our brand new home in Alexander House. You will recognize that this sounds just like our old office, and you wouldn’t be far from the truth. Although we are in the same building, we are now all the way up on the top floor, with fantastic views of everything our city has to offer, combined with an open floor plan that optimizes workflow and communication!
Like any SaaS company that has scaled quickly, many of us were amateurs when it came to packing up and moving. So we wanted to share our experience with you! Hopefully, providing some key advice to those other fast-growing startups. Particularly important is how we fit a 10ft long sofa into a very small elevator!
Moving Risk Assessment & Guidelines
When involving your team in the moving process, no matter at what level, it’s vital that you perform a risk assessment and try to control/mitigate the risks as much as possible. Lucky for us, we had a mobile-ready risk assessment platform at our fingertips. By using AuditComply we were able to create our own bespoke assessment templates in a matter of minutes, specifically suited to our needs and requirements during the move. When conducting risk assessments of the new office the AuditComply team were without WiFi but this didn’t stop them! With AuditComply users can conduct and upload their assessments with no dependency on a Wifi or data signal.
Just remember:
-It’s important to assess your environment, both the office you’re moving from and to. Take the time to look round your new location and consider it in terms of the move.
-Think about transporting the items to the new location – will it be easy to get them into the building and up to the appropriate floor? Are there any fire exits or walkways that you might risk obstructing during the move? Are there any leaks, broken floorboards or loose cables making the new office structure unsafe?
Think Security
As a SaaS company, we take security very seriously. Security needs to be implemented, managed and monitored during a move. Ensure the entire team are briefed on the risks, security implications and preventive actions that can be taken during the move to ensure premises and systems are secure.
Processes & Checklists
It is well known that when people follow documented processes and checklists, quality is maintained. If processes and checklists are not used, items are missed or not completed correctly and quality can deteriorate rapidly. Ensure the team have a defined, documented and communicated set of processes, flow diagrams and checklists before the project starts.
By using AuditComply, our assessment reports were automatically graded and communicated to all team members, with images, observations and details of non-conformities delivered directly to their inboxes in real-time. This time-saving feature allowed us to spot potential issues and risks during our moving process before they turned into bigger problems!
Be Completely Transparent & Over-Communicate. Do It For Your Team.
It’s important to remember, moving office can be a stressful event and cause anxiety for many individuals. Let’s be honest, not everyone likes change. Therefore, we made it a top priority to communicate everything.
As a SaaS-based risk assessment platform, with the vision of helping organizations get rid of those tedious, cumbersome and time-consuming paper-based systems, change is something many of us have become accustomed to. However, we do understand everyone’s different and deal with change in their own way! Team happiness and mental health is a top priority for AuditComply, so we made sure everyone was supported in that regard.
After some hard work from the whole team, it’s safe to say we have happily moved into our new home. As Christmas shortly followed, we had the opportunity to decorate the office in bright lights, colourful decorations and place a big Christmas tree in the middle. AuditComply is built in an environment that promotes innovation and creativity, making it a space many of us never want to leave! We make it our priority to be always listening and learning but we hope these lessons and tips help your company during your growth phase!
Here’s to a great 2019.
For those that don’t know us, our new address is Floor 4, Alexander House, 17 Ormeau Ave, Belfast BT2 8HD.