Simple logistics with managing offices these past few days

We have some new folks coming from other buildings here on campus (Microsoft calls its set of buildings a campus, by the way) but we don't have space for them yet.  In an effort to ensure we can build effective teams, we need to get everyone involved in OneNote together in one building.  There are simply too many hallway conversations, ad hoc meetings, discussions over coffee and the like to have people spread all over the place.

So one of my tasks this week has been the seemingly simple task of clearing out space within some of our existing offices to give the new testers a place to stay.  And that part was actually easy - we have a great set of testers that understand the need to build an effective team and they all were willing to adjust their offices as needed.

Next up was getting some small desks to use.  This was a bit trickier and took some legwork, but I found enough desks within our team to get everyone that needs one a desk.

Chairs are a different matter.  We did not have enough so I had to order some.  They won't be in until next week, so actually sitting is not possible (yet).

Initially, I had thought computers would be hard to coordinate.  We don't want to lug computers and monitors around campus - test tends to have many pieces of hardware for obvious reasons - just to reduce the possibility of breaking equipment.  Fortunately, we have enough lab type machines stashed in corners that we can use as remote desktop machines so everyone can log into their "real" hardware back in their "real" offices.  We have a small storeroom where I got cables and power cords (and one power brick).

The last thing needed is a mouse and keyboard.  I can't help anyone there, so the expectation is to carry this with you to the new temporary office.

Coordinating all this took a fair amount of time.  Even the simple logistics of moving a few desks and chairs around has a definite cost, measured in my time and the time of people I talk with.  But we expect the benefits of the shuffle to be much greater than this small investment.

Nothing special here - just simple logistics.

Questions, comments, concerns and criticisms always welcome,
John