There’s a certain official feeling to having your own office space – but knowing if it’s the right time to start hunting for an office for rent is a tricky proposition. It’s one thing to just want to escape the distractions of a home office, but quite another to need a place where you can truly grow your business.
These are a few signs you might have outgrown that basement office for good:
You need staff, but you have no room for them. Virtual teams can work great under the right circumstances, but nothing beats working with someone face to face. Support staff, especially, are best kept close by so you can grab their attention as necessary. In a home office, support staff can feel awkward or out of place – and often there’s just not anywhere to put them.
Your clients want to meet face-to-face. True professionals don’t always meet clients in loud coffee shops or busy restaurants, they meet them in their own office. If you’re in a business where you’ll be expected to give presentations or demonstrations of your skill in person, having an office is a good way to set the appropriate tone right from the beginning. Turning your office into your pre-presentation can tell potential clients a lot about your company.
You need more space. A home office can be a great place for businesses that don’t spread out, but if you need more room than your desk allows, you may quickly run out of office space. Even with paperless offices being the new norm, some companies still need physical things in order to function. If you’re one of these or you’re running an eCommerce business and still do your own fulfillment, you may need a commercial office just to get a little more elbow room.
You can’t shut work off. There are some people who thrive in a home office environment and others who let it slowly suck the life out of them. If you can’t turn work off even if you’re elsewhere in your home, you may need to spare your sanity by finding an office for rent. Resting and recharging makes for a better tomorrow, no matter what industry you’re in – but if you never stop thinking about work, you never get a chance to do that.
Just because you’ve got it in the budget to have an office doesn’t mean you need to go out and get one if what you’re doing now is working just fine. However, if you’ve been thinking about taking the leap to a bigger space for some time and your business is cash flowing well enough to support the additional cost of an office, follow your gut and go take a look at some commercial real estate. You may find that the additional motivation of paying for an office space helps push you a little harder to grow your business even more.