Hunting for an office

I have started the hunt for a an office space to house the new operation that I will be incharge of in a couple of months. Before I move on to take it up completely, I need to find a place and set-up the infrastructure in-place. So the top item in the agends is to find a decent office location.

When yo talking about offices in Sri Lanka, there are two paths you can take. One is the more traditional way of renting out space in a commercial building. Commercial buildings are the easiest palces to setup offices as they provide most of the amneties needed for such a place. Also, you have the option of sharing some of the costs such as security and janitorial services with the other occupants of the building. Plus, if you are lucky, you may find a place which is more or less in a ready to move in condition, provided you can source the furniture at short notice.

But commercial spaces tend to have a few nuisances as well. Parking is a problem with most commercial areas. Plus, since you are sharing the building with other establishments, given the current security situation in the country, commercial establishments are at a higher security risk. Add to that some commercial building have restrictions on the working hours, equipment, etc.

The second path which you can take is to rent a decent house and convert it to an office. This is a path a lot of small offices take as it is easier to find houses and they tend to cost a little bit lesser comparatively. Plus, by getting a house converted to an office gives you enough freedom to set it up the way you want. You can create provate spaces for the teams in your company using the rooms of the house without spending on partitioning. Also, you have the privacy and the freedom to work in an environment which can be located in a more calm and quiet environment.

The added headaches are you need to worry about security and janitorial services exclusively for the location as the chances of sharing those costs are almost non-existant. Also, you may need to do some modifications such as lighting to create an office environment, and electrical and network cabling.

Finally there are the neighbours that you have to be concerned about. Some neighbours do not like an office being setup in thier next door. They might consider it to be a invasion of thier privacy. Also, you have to be careful about your employees not disturbing the residential neighbourhood.

With all these things in mind, I am on the lookout for a office space! I prefer a commercial space as it will give us the fastest route to setup the operations with the builti-in options that are available.