Maintaining a business comes with many important responsibilities that you might not have considered before. The global pandemic has definitely set hygiene as a top priority in each space, especially in public. And whereas there are health standards that businesses require to even open, let alone maintain working permits, managing Health & Safety standards is a moral thing to do. Some of the globally accepted standards are AS/NZS 4801-2001 and ISO 45001.
How is a clean office connected to productivity?
Additionally, a 2018 study has linked employee productivity and overall job satisfaction to the cleanliness of the working environment. Employees’ perception of their productivity is affected by the dirt and dust around them, which subsequently affects their real productivity and results. Here are some great results when maintaining a clean environment.
Reduced sick leave
Less dirt equals fewer chances for germ build-up and sickness that may come as a result. A dirty workplace is more likely to give viruses and infections and allergens—the opportunity to spread within your working environment. Sick people, apart from absenteeism, have poorer work performance if still coming to work or not at all when being absent. Subsequently, this can make a giant hole in a few months’ incomes that would be less likely to happen with regular cleaning.
Protecting equipment
Along with regular cleaning, the overall tidiness of the place is related to how you organise it. This simply means that every piece of equipment should have its spot. If your business includes multiple pieces of tools, ensure there is enough place to keep each tool safe and protected. The same rule applies to businesses that include many paperwork or businesses that include multiple sets of products. Provide shelves, boxes, or closets, and thus your business’s equipment will be protected as it will be easier to return it to its designated place than leave it elsewhere where it could be forgotten.
Professional cleaning services provide the best results
Whatever your goals when doing business, no one can do a better job at cleaning maintenance than professionals. To put it simply, the time you don’t need to spend checking or cleaning, the professional equipment, and the efficiency are all pro for hiring a professional cleaning service. A professional service crew for carpet cleaning from Perth explains that the professional steam cleaner is essential when cleaning the dirt that has been trapped in the carpet. Imagine how many pathogens are introduced to your office with 10+ people from different backgrounds entering the office each day!
Doing minor cleaning tasks themselves
When the place is tidy and neatly organised, we tend not to want to disturb the order but to maintain it instead. Even smell plays a major role here, as the 2018 Harvard Business Review study has concluded. Scent branding is a major vogue when trying to differentiate your business on the market. The smells are often connected to the physical vision of the business, be it the comfy leather sofas in the waiting room, or the smell of baby linen in the baby clothes store. Thus, the employees will also connect a certain vision of the office with the smell and maintain the order they see when they come to the office. Certainly, they should not do the work outside of their job responsibilities, but sorted papers and almost empty bins definitely make a difference.
Better efficiency
Connected to the order and vision of the office your employees would want to maintain, better efficiency will also come in time. When each piece of equipment, tool, or even simple paperwork is kept in the provided place, each employee will not need to waste time searching or tidying after other employees and thus doing less in their original role. Additionally, once a habit, each employee will start to spend more time looking for a needed thing that will, in turn, slow the time needed to complete a task. Finally, this will result in a low-productivity environment where you will start losing money and the employees that want to grow in their business environment.
Promote safety and boost morals
The Health & Safety standards include safety as an obligatory precaution measure that is issued to protect employees from accidents. International Labour Organization estimates that more than 340 million work-related accidents happen annually. This is why the standards are not recommended; they are a must. Protecting your employees further establishes the company as responsible and likable by the general public. This is an important factor when considering the foundation for employees’ motivation and respect for the business owners.
Less stress
An environment that clearly takes care of the people who are supposed to be there is understandably less stressful. The fact that there is no dust, dirt, or germs and that everything is sorted is already a great indicator that the process of work is known, possible to follow, and leave without experiencing stress and confusion from chaos. In turn, employees know what is expected of them and are able to adjust easily to the professional environment. Improved professional look, especially from clients’ perspective, is a feature that is certainly desired by most business owners. Investing in keeping the environment clean is definitely a big task for every business owner, startup, or major company.
