A clean and tidy office helps employees stay focused on their work and be productive. Cluttered desks, dirty floors, foul-smelling indoor air, sticky desktops – these distractions can make your office unpleasant for everyone. As a result, employees can also be more susceptible to viruses that cause coughs, colds, and flu.
If you want your employees to be productive and have fewer sick days, it’s best to ensure cleanliness and hygiene in your office. Here are 10 professional cleaning tips to help you out.
1. Designate daily, weekly, and monthly cleaning tasks.
Whether you work alone in a private office or manage many employees in a rented office space, you need to designate tasks as daily, weekly, and monthly must-dos.
Following a cleaning schedule makes it easier to keep your workplace clean, hygienic, and organized. It also breaks down all the cleaning into smaller, manageable tasks that you can finish in ten minutes. Spending this small amount of time each day tidying will save you the hassle of coming in on the weekends or sacrificing an entire day for an office-wide general cleaning.
Here’s an example of tasks that you can do daily, weekly, or monthly:
| DAILY | WEEKLY | MONTHLY (or as needed) |
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2. Invest in quality cleaning supplies.
One of the most important professional cleaning tips to remember is to use high-quality cleaning materials to get the best results. Quality cleaning supplies cost more than below-average brushes, sponges, cloth rags, etc. However, they are often worth the extra dollars because they make cleaning faster and easier.
For example, a high-quality scouring pad can remove more grime with fewer strokes and less elbow grease than a lower-quality pad. It’s the same with glass cleaners: fingerprints and dirt are easier to remove when you use high-quality products. The glass gets clearer and shines more than when you use cheaper, less refined cleaning solutions.
To find out which cleaning products and equipment are worth buying for your office, check out online reviews and forum discussions and ask for recommendations from people who clean for a living.
3. Consider investing in a steam cleaner.
Buying a steam cleaner to use in your office would be a good investment. Even with disinfectants, mopping floors can get unhygienic when cleaning several rooms in one go. When you reach the last one, you’ll have a bucket with dirty water, and your mop will likely spread germs instead of killing them.
A steam cleaner is a more efficient and hygienic alternative to the trusty mop and bucket. Many models let you use washable microfiber covers instead of disposable ones, making them more eco-friendly. More importantly, steam cleaners come with different attachments for cleaning objects and surfaces like window sills, walls, carpets, upholstered furniture, grout, tiles, and glass.
4. Keep a trash bin by your desk.
One of the most effective ways to keep clutter off your desk is to have a trash bin nearby. If you have crumpled Post-it notes, gum wrappers, pencil shavings, etc., you can throw them out immediately instead of pushing them to a corner of your desk.
5. Push the vacuum cleaner slowly.
A useful tip to use a vacuum cleaner more effectively is to push it slowly. Sometimes, pushing the vacuum too quickly means it doesn’t have time to pick up as much dust and debris as it ideally should. As a result, the floor is still dusty after the first run-through, so you have to do a second round of vacuuming. It’s a waste of time and will double your electric consumption.
Vacuuming slowly but correctly gets the job done faster than if you rush through the chore. The same applies to steam cleaners and cordless, handheld vacuums. A few slow passes will clean better than multiple quick passes.
6. Scrub the pantry and bathroom sink with Brillo pads.
Soap residue accumulates around the faucets in the bathroom and office kitchen sinks. These areas are often wet because many people wash their hands or mugs daily. If you have a liquid soap dispenser or a bar of soap, you can be sure there’s soap residue where the sink and wall meet.
Soap may have germ-killing and antibacterial properties, but if it stands too long in the water, it becomes sticky and could become a breeding ground for germs. Therefore, it’s best to remove whatever residue is on your sink by scrubbing them off. Scouring pads by Brillo work well for this.
Lastly, make it a housekeeping rule to dry the sink after use. Keep a dry kitchen rag or towel nearby so that people using the bathroom sink or pantry sink can wipe the drops and splashes when they’re done.
7. Wipe down your refrigerator with a bit of olive oil.
Another pro cleaning tip from professionals: if your fridge has a shiny, reflective surface (like with stainless refrigerators) and is prone to finger and hand prints, you can eliminate the unsightly marks with some olive oil.
Pour a small amount on a paper towel and wipe it all over the refrigerator doors and handles. The oil will remove the visible marks and make the surface more resistant to fingerprints and handprints. Be careful not to use too much: you don’t want your hand covered with grease every time you open or close the fridge.
8. Clean and vacuum your office chair.
Office chairs are prone to accumulating loose dirt and debris. Upholstered chairs attract dust. Meanwhile, chairs with faux leather have deep crevices that tend to collect so much dust and debris. Simply dusting off your chair isn’t enough; you must vacuum it to remove the fine dirt between the creases or in the foam.
Use a vacuum with an upholstery brush nozzle. You can also use a handheld steam vacuum cleaner, but take the chair out in the sun and let it dry thoroughly before using it again. If dirt is still clinging to the chair, you can wipe it off with a microfiber cloth.
9. Organize.
Organization is vital in eliminating visual clutter in an office. If you organize well, you can maximize your office’s horizontal and vertical storage spaces. Being organized will also expose the things you need to throw out. If something doesn’t have a designated place, you’ll have to decide whether to keep it and make a space for it or get rid of it.
Use office organization materials like filers for folders, stacking trays for memos and loose documents, and filing cabinets or closed shelving for things you need to keep in your office.
Notice the cluttered areas in your office, and find an organizer to keep your stuff in order. For example, if you have a drawer that’s becoming like a kitchen junk drawer, consider buying drawer organizers so that your pens, highlighters, paperclips, and other small items won’t be a jumbled mess.
10. Hire a professional cleaning service.
The professional cleaning tips we’ve shared so far are all doable. Anyone can do them if given enough time and proper cleaning materials. But sometimes we don’t have the time or materials to do all the cleaning ourselves. If you often find yourself in this situation, you can hire a professional office cleaning service instead.
The best thing about cleaning services is they can clean outside your office hours, so there’s no interruption to your operating hours. You can also set the date and time whenever it’s convenient for you.
Follow these professional cleaning tips regularly, and you’ll likely see an improvement in your office. If these cleaning tasks become habitual and integrated into your daily routine, keeping your office clean and tidy with minimal effort will be much easier.
If you want to hand the cleaning over to professionals, call Town House Specialty Cleaning. We’ve been cleaning offices, banks, government facilities, and other commercial buildings since 1969. We have licensed, OSHA-trained technicians and can provide full-service cleaning and disinfecting services.
Use our free estimate tool to get a free estimate. You may also contact us for more information about our services.