Are you ready for everyone to come back? These are the key things you need to consider in order to prepare. Preparing the office for your colleagues to return Returning items to their owners Your office won’t go back to exactly how it was at the start of 2020. You’ll have some remote employees. Others will have moved on. Desk arrangements won’t be the same. This means that when you return, there will be a lot of stuff to sort out, including personal items left behind. To resolve this, take pictures of each lost item and add them to a Microsoft Teams Document or Google Doc. Then, share that with the company, and ask everyone to comment on the photos of the items that are theirs in order to claim them. Remind everyone three to four times, and wait a couple months before donating leftover items. “We’re focused on fun just as much as on training. Apart from the cleaning preparation, I’ve assembled goodie bags with fun treats, bubbles, whistles, lip chap, and such for the day we return. We’ll also do a theme day each Friday for a few weeks to bring things back to a team feel. And Puppy Thursday will resume, where employees are invited to bring their socialized dogs to work” Maria Ferronato, Office Manager at The Gentleman Pros Welcoming everyone back What can you do to make people feel welcome? How can you ease their anxiety over the transition? While some people will be excited to get back to work, others might be reluctant or sad. Keep your company culture in mind, and find ways to be welcoming that align with that culture. One company might offer mini fruit salad bowls and TikTok-worthy drip coffee, while another might offer pizza lunch and silly gag gifts. Ordering new supplies While this might seem obvious, ordering new office supplies could get forgotten in the hubbub of organizing actual people for the first time in a while. We’re sure last year’s lunch leftovers have been tossed, but there might be some other things that have expired. For example, if you have office snacks and powdered coffee creamer, you might want to check the expiration dates. Next, review the stock of all of your most essential supplies. Consider how quickly important supplies might get used once everyone returns. Toilet paper, paper, and pens are all things that might have moved slowly with a small percentage of your workforce at this office. But with things in full swing, you wouldn’t want to run out suddenly. Later in this guide, we explore ways to make your office greener than ever. 9 gett.com