Percentages are a language that executives understand very well. Give them numbers, and they’ll be more likely to get on board. How can you do this? Survey workers about how much time they spend on average, looking for resources like empty conference rooms, fax or copy machines, other coworkers, etc. Use that to estimate how many hours and dollars the company is losing because too much time being lost on the search.
Before you even say the word “software” to an executive, you may want to consider talking to other departments first. Why? One way to get executives’ attention is to show them what their employees want. Perhaps workers are frustrated by having to navigate a large office building, but they don’t know that there’s a solution out there. In which case, the worker survey mentioned above could also include a section gauging their interest in the software. If the response is strong enough, it could be a good bargaining chip when you present your case to the executives.
How many floor plans do you have to print out each month? How often are they actually useful, before employee churn makes them completely irrelevant? Software can solve that problem. It will give you a dynamic view of each floor can help cut down on the company’s overall paper use. Plus, reporting features can also let you see how many people are occupying each floor, so if you notice that some spaces could be consolidated and energy costs could be lowered, you can help the company save money.
It’s safe to assume that growth is a major goal for your company. Would the office really be prepared for all that growth entails, though? Like an influx of employees requiring a move to a bigger building? Or the need to keep the business operating during the moving process? With space management software, a facilities manager can see when a building is nearing capacity, thus preventing the problem of having too many people in a too-small space. The software can also help keep the move itself organized, by tracking who and what are still in the old building vs. the new building during the move. Furthermore, the software can also create what-if floor plans, allowing FMs to experiment with different office layouts. This can cut down on time and resources that may otherwise be spent re-arranging furniture during the move-in.
Moves on a smaller scale can also lead to lost revenue. Moving just one employee requires coordination between several different teams—HR, IT, maintenance, etc. If there’s a communication breakdown between any of these parties, productivity stops. For example, say HR notifies IT and maintenance that a new hire will be coming in within two weeks’ time. Two weeks come and go…and the new hire’s work station isn’t ready. One (or possibly both) teams forgot they needed to set it up. Software prevents this problem by automatically sending each party an email about the move. With this system in place, there are no unpleasant surprises, and no abandoning work to complete a last-minute move.
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