Tag Archive for: IT relocation

Managing An Office IT Move

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Engineering the Perfect IT Relocation

The need to expand is a sure sign that your business is heading in the right direction, but expansion brings with it a series of logistical and operational challenges.

And, given the importance of IT in modern business, it should come as no surprise that migrating your IT operations is one of the most crucial aspects to consider when relocating to new premises. It can be a difficult and testing process, but one that, if engineered and planned correctly, can provide a seamless transition. Managing this move, therefore, is vital, so let’s take a look at what you need to consider.

Server Relocation

Without servers, your business has no backbone to its IT operations and its ability to remain competitive becomes significantly reduced, if not completely extinguished. And this fact remains true for as long as your servers are down. Consequently, relocating your servers needs to be planned thoroughly in order to reduce the downtime and the impact this has upon your organisation. One of your first steps, therefore, should be to draw up a thorough plan of when and how you will begin the relocation process.

However, whilst planning is certainly the key to success, the real challenge comes when you begin the physical removal of your servers and all their accompanying equipment. Remember, servers are not only bulky items, but they’re also fragile and contain incredibly valuable and sensitive data. Ensuring that this is transported correctly, therefore, is paramount. Thankfully, working with a professional and experienced removal company can guarantee peace of mind that your equipment will be transported safely.

Migrating Phone Lines and the Internet

Servers may be crucial for your organisation’s IT network to run efficiently, but equally important are the phone lines and the internet. It’s common to assume that every building in the 21st century is equipped and ready to cope with the demands of modern business communication, but this couldn’t be further from the truth. And that’s why it’s so important that, as part of your site survey, you evaluate the existing communication lines of any potential new premises.

There’s a chance that everything will be perfect, but this will be relatively small unless you’re relocating into bespoke premises. Installing new phone lines to cope with the demands of your business is likely to be required and this can take time to finalise. Time, of course, is highly valuable when it comes to relocating your IT solutions, so this is, again, a step that you need to take early on in the relocation process to reduce any downtime.

Prepare a Relocation Contingency Plan

It’s clear that organising and planning a successful IT relocation project is essential to keep your organisation’s IT functioning smoothly and consistently. However, the logistics involved in relocation mean that these projects rarely run to plan. And, with so much at stake, it’s vital that you have a contingency plan in place. Additionally, multiple backups of your data are imperative as relocation projects are prone to data emergencies.

Working with external professionals with experience running relocation projects involving complex IT systems is an effective way to help mitigate these risks.

If you’d like any advice on your next relocation project, don’t hesitate to get in touch.

IT Relocations

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How to Plan an Office Move

Office IT Relocations can be a complex manoeuvre because of the desire to maintain your regular day-to-day activities while avoiding any major business disruptions. Many people view the hard part of planning an office move or office relocation as finding a new space and then outsourcing to the moving company, but things are much more complex than that when you take all the IT requirements into account.

IT Relocation & Office Moves – The Procedure

As one would expect, the absolute key to a successful office move is planning far in advance. A team needs to be assembled to determine the key dates of the move, as well as distributing the relocation budget.

There are various tasks that must be completed, such as booking the movers, disposing of old equipment, and notifying your customers of the move. A larger team is helpful for thinking of these contingencies, although you may wish to use a relocation consultant who has been through this before.

Your Business Relocation Continuity Plan

IT relocations can be executed much more smoothly if you have a proper business continuity plan that details how your voice and data services are going to be transferred over. You should have a plan for how you can plan IT upgrades at the time of moving at this point.

The Office Relocation plan you put together will detail how your data and important documents are backed up and stored off site (in case of emergency).

The inventory list you will have prepared as part of your checklist above will be helpful both with dealing with the movers and reassembling your office when your equipment reaches the new office.

Facilitating Your IT Relocation

IT relocations & office moves are a difficult to pull off without previous experience. There are invariably going to be unforeseen problems, but you need to be ready to solve them at a moment’s notice so as to avoid missing out on revenue.

The most frequent problem during office relocations is to do with the IT systems, which is why you should assemble a team who is devoted to planning and managing the way new systems will be implemented over the course of your office relocation.

The key to successful office IT relocation is in going through a checklist of all the things that could possibly go wrong, and mitigating the risks early on. Here are several questions to ask yourself:

  • Do we have a relocation business continuity plan?
  • Have we contacted all our Internet Service Providers regarding this move?
  • Have we performed an audit and inventory of all our current systems?
  • Do we need to upgrade any of our systems or equipment in the foreseeable future?

By properly assessing what you have and what you need, it is possible to turn your office move into a net benefit for everyone. Relocating your old telecoms system can be just as difficult (or more difficult) than moving to a new one.

Additionally, if you are planning on recruiting or onboarding new staff as part of your office move, you will have a whole new set of variables to cope with. This is why it is recommended that any upgrades you would be considering over the next 2-3 years be executed during a move.This sort of strong continuity should be your overarching goal throughout the whole move. However there is also a real opportunity to plan for the future and make changes that will set you up for success over the long-term.

Read more on IT Relocation & Office Moves

IT RELOCATION LONDON

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IT Relocation Checklist

The Internet has brought innumerable benefits in the last 15-20 years, but with that has come added complexity to the systems that make everything possible. In the background of every email or file transfer you execute at work is a whole ecosystem of IT infrastructure.

So if you are moving office, it’s important you plan the relocation of your IT network with care.

Office IT Relocation Checklist

Beyond the obvious goal of needing to move your entire IT infrastructure from one building to another. Your ultimate goal is to minimize the downtime your office experiences as a result of the move. There are numerous office relocation checklists out there to help you prepare for the move. We are going to focus on some of the major pitfalls of moving office and how you can mitigate them.

  1. Warn your provider – Contact all technology vendors, internet service providers and carriers well before you make your move. These are your acting partners in your IT relocation, so you want them to be part of the planning process. Two months is the minimum amount of warning you should give.
  2. Upgrade your technology – Moving office is great opportunity to evaluate your entire IT infrastructure and determine what should be upgraded. Every item you choose to upgrade won’t need to be moved. Upgrades can be up and running well before you move offices. Similarly, if you are leasing any items, you can use this as a chance to upgrade and move the replacement items into your new offices early.
  3. Determine communications requirements – Each site has varying capabilities and characteristics, so it is important you determine your exact needs when it comes to data cabling, phone lines, and Internet and power outlets well before you move in. It could turn out the entire building is in need of an upgrade to meet your specifications. Infrastructure upgrades must be planned early on in the process.
  4. Do a walk-through – By planning far ahead of time and knowing where each item in your IT network will be located in your new office, you can start to cover the smaller details and problems as well. Your vendors should walk through the new office with you, since they will have more experience in spotting the smaller potential problems.
  5. Protect your data – This has become a huge industry recently, and for good reason. Your data is important to the running of your business and quality of your service. You need secure backups in case anything goes awry in the move.

 

Hopefully your office relocation won’t seem so daunting.

It’s important to remember whether you have dedicated IT department or a managed IT support provider. You aren’t in this alone and there will likely be some sort of a tenant advisory package available to you.

If you plan everything ahead and stress-test your assumptions, you’ll be able to execute your IT relocation in a time efficient and cost effective manner.

Office IT relocation can be an extremely demanding. We can take the stress and strain out of this; call us for more information on complete IT relocation and Telecoms relocation service.

Contact Us: 0844 770 0199