Top Tips for Entrepreneurs: Essential Steps for your First Office Set-up

Although a lot of entrepreneurs might start out from a laptop in their bedroom, at some point you’ll need to set up your first office. Depending on the field you’re in, the size of office you have and the kinds of facilities you need will vary, but there will always be a few key things you’ll have to bear in mind. Here are those first essential steps towards the perfect office set-up.

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Try to plan ahead

You don’t have to go buying an entire floor of a building in the beginning, but that doesn’t mean you should be short-sighted either. Chances are, you’ll have big ambitions, but you need to make sure that you have enough space to take on the key employees you’ll need in order to get your business off the ground. Plus, you’ll need some extra space for any freelancers and contractors onsite for outsourcing purposes, as well as room for additional employees.

Think about servers and systems

You may have been used to operating from a single email and internet connection, but once you start to take on employees, the playing field can change dramatically. Typically, you’ll need your own server if there’s more than five of you.

This will enable you to have shared drives for projects that can be edited by several people at once without your system going down or slowing. You’ll also need to think about phone systems too. In the beginning, you may want to keep your workforce mobile, with contract smartphones and a virtual switchboard, but bear in mind business growth and the need for your own phone system later on.

Invest in your equipment

It is vital that you leave some capital aside for good quality equipment. Not only will it slow the working environment if you have to keep paying for repairs because you bought cheaply, but it can even affect the morale of your employees if they have to work with outdated equipment.

Printers in particular are the perfect example of this idea in action; you might think you only need a basic model, and how hard can that be to find? But once your company starts to grow and you factor in the needs of your clients, you’ll find that you need a multifunctional printer with numerous trays, printing functions, email sharing ability, scanning and faxing capability as well as great quality printing.

Bulk buy and save

You’ll need to keep a tight rein on finances in any size of business, so bulk-buying items that you use a lot of within your office can help you to save money. Printer paper and ink are the best culprits to use for this example, as you can find plenty of online deals aimed at small to medium businesses on top brand and equipment, like Dell, Canon, Brother and hp photosmart ink cartridges.

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