How to Set Up a Satellite Office: 3 Key Things to Consider

The landscape of office work is drastically different today than it was twenty, ten, or even five years ago. Of course, much of that is due to the COVID-19 pandemic and how it has impacted the way organizations operate.

With many people forced to do their jobs from home in 2020 and 2021, new ways of working and hiring have become the norm. Companies have spread out their organizations across the country, recruiting and operating remotely from different cities, provinces—and sometimes even beyond.

But as employees have been returning to in-person and hybrid work arrangements, this has led to the need for more office spaces in multiple locations. A single branch or headquarters is no longer a viable option for a team of employees who live all over the country. 

Satellite offices provide a solution to this problem.

In this article, you’ll learn more about these modern workspaces and how you can effectively set up a satellite office for your business.

What Is a Satellite Office?

A satellite office is a branch of a larger company that is physically separate from the organization’s main brick-and-mortar workplace. Typically, a company will open up a satellite office in a different city from their main branch or headquarters in order to offer employees who live in another area a place to work.

These spaces can range dramatically in size, depending on a company’s needs. Some satellite offices offer a place to work for one or two employees. Others provide a workspace for dozens of staff.

The Benefits of a Satellite Office

Satellite offices offer the opportunity for organizations to expand their operations to other regions. They can also provide more scalable professional workplaces for employees who may not live near a company’s main offices.

Often, opening up a satellite office is also more affordable than duplicating your organization’s headquarters. This can be attributed to lower overhead. For example, when compared to an actual branch office, satellite workplaces typically require less space due to fewer employees.

How to Set Up Your Satellite Office

3 Key Things to Consider When Looking for Your New Space

1. Be Strategic in Picking Your Location

When it comes to real estate of any kind, it’s always important to carefully consider your location. The same is true for your satellite office.

Before settling into just any space, take into account where your employees live. You should also have a good understanding of the area you’re considering. 

Here are a few questions you can ask yourself to identify an ideal spot for your office:

• Is the area you’ve chosen convenient for the people who will be using it?
• Are there places nearby for your employees to go get lunch or a coffee? At And-Co, for instance, our on-site restaurant, NOX, is an ideal place to have an elevated meal with your team or with clients.
• Is the location easy for your team to access by transit? 

Making your satellite office central, yet accessible can make all the difference in whether or not your employees actually want to use it.

2. Align your space with employees’ work styles

Once you’ve decided on a general area for your satellite office, you’ll want to evaluate the actual spaces you’re looking at. One of the most important aspects to consider while looking at a potential office is how your team will work within the space. 

Pre-pandemic, many offices offered similar—if not the same—open-concept bullpen workplaces. Remote work has helped teams recognize that this type of space doesn’t necessarily support all employees. Sometimes it even hinders certain individuals ability to be productive and focus.

Allowing for a combination of desking stations, open booths, private areas and communal places—also known as spatial diversity—can help your employees perform at their best.

3. Engage your team with a vibrant workplace

Since satellite offices are typically lean on staff, it means that these environments can be—for lack of a better word—boring. For this reason, it’s important to consider ways that you can keep employees engaged. 

One way to do this is by offering amenities within your space. A kitchen and a small lunch area, or access to a workout space can make employees feel more relaxed and fulfilled while at the office.

But you can also take this concept one step further.

In the modern professional landscape, there’s a lot of overlap between our personal and professional lives. The lines between work and home are blurred, meaning the quality of one impacts the other.

Offering a space that enhances employees’ lives and general well-being is another way in which you can keep your staff feeling connected to your organization. With a workspace that offers regular social, professional, and networkking events, provides a connected professional community, supports health and wellness, and offers unparallled convenience, you can drastically enhance your company’s employee value proposition.

Considerations like these can help create a welcoming and engaging space for your team. Your office won’t be just a place to go sit at a desk. It’ll be a place they look forward to going to.

Why Flexible Workspaces Are Ideal Satellite Offices

A shared workspace is an ideal option for satellite teams because it allows employees to have the full office experience without the hefty price tag of a commercial real estate lease. 

Here are the top five reasons to consider a flexible workspace—like And-Co—as your satellite office. A shared space like ours can offer:

1. A more affordable way to work. Instead of having to pay for a long-term, high-priced traditional lease, you can pay for the space you need now—for as long as you need it.
   
2. Spatially diverse workstations. For teams who work differently, And-Co provides hard, soft, private, communal and rest spaces to meet the needs of your employees.
   
3. Opportunities to be social. If your satellite team is made up of only one or two employees, flexible workplaces provide the chance to connect with other like-minded professionals.
   
4. Inviting amenities and tools. Provide your employees with a fitness centre, community events, a restaurant, and more at a fraction of the cost of getting a full-time office of your own.
   
5. A professional place to meet clients. For organizations who need their remote team to meet with local clients, having an impressive office reflects well on your brand.

What Makes Vancouver a Great Market for Satellite Offices?

It can be difficult to budget for your office space in a city like Vancouver. Especially post-pandemic, you have to contend with an unprecedented corporate environment, including uncertain market fluctuations and Vancouver’s exceptionally high real estate prices. 

With a flexible office space, you can offer a vibrant place to work with fully-appointed furnished suites in a central location. All without sinking your budget into a 10-year commercial lease.

A dynamic workspace like And-Co, lets you set up a satellite office the way you want, with the budget you have.

If you’re in search of a modern, full-service, and flexible workspace and community with sustainability at its core, book a tour of And-Co today.