In our modern age, it is nearly impossible to manage a business without a great deal of tasks being managed digitally, and this results in employees spending long hours in a chair at their desks. Even if your business requires more physical work, such as construction, you still have to balance your budget, contact clients, manage plans, and tend to a multitude of other digital tasks. The end result is the same: one or many workers will spend their day stationary in a single chair.

With this in mind, it stands to reason that having the proper office chair is crucial. The human body was designed to be mobile, and forcing your spine to be angled in an awkward, uncomfortable, and unsupportive position has a vast range of complications. How can businesses reconcile the need for staying seated with the needs of the spine? The solution is ergonomic chairs – specially designed to curve to the shape of your back and support all the necessary regions.

By investing in these cutting-edge chairs, you can not only prevent spinal issues, but also boost productivity in the entire workforce – and here are five ways how:

1. Employees Can Work Longer

When you are confided to a chair which resembles a torture chamber more than a seat, you find yourself uncomfortable and wishing to end the workday as fast as possible. This cuts into productivity, as employees are unwilling to work longer hours to meet deadlines or put in additional time for the benefit of the company. Ergonomic chairs eliminate this issue, as they are designed to fit and support the lumbar, reducing discomfort and even long-term pain which resulted from years of work in an unsupportive chair. If employees are able to sit comfortably as they complete their tasks, then the desire to escape work and avoid additional hours at their desk is removed. This boosts productivity.

1. Employees Can Work Harder

In the same way that employees are able to work longer, the supportive structure of the chair allows them to place more focus on their tasks. Rather than being distracted by the pain in their backs, or having to constantly readjust their position to alleviate the discomfort, they can focus on the workload and handle it with greater efficiency. Time which would have otherwise been spent walking around to work out their spine can now be devoted to handling that deadline, and this focus allows them to hone their abilities. The work your employees can produce with an ergonomic chair will be of higher quality.

1. Employees Can Work More Comfortably

• It improves posture.

We’ve all done it – and most of us still do it. After a few hours of sitting at your desk with many tasks on your mind, you do that slow descent forwards, curving your back and slouching your shoulders until you resemble Lord of the Ring’s Gollum, hunched over your keyboard. While this may be comfortable for the time, it’s very damaging to your back and will result in long-term spinal issues which can plague you for life. By investing in ergonomic chairs, the seat and backrest is designed to naturally encourage you to sit straighter with better posture. So even if the workload is heavy, you’re tired, or you’ve had a lifetime of bad posture habits to encourage the slouch, the chair will take the initiative and compel your spine into the right form. This boosts comfort as well as long-term health, making employees work at a better rate.

• Workers feel better at the end of the day.

Once employees have spent a workday in the comfort of an ergonomic chair, their backs will feel relaxed and free of the typical strain one experiences after a long day. This allows them to return home and enjoy their time without having to “unwind” from work, making them more energetic for the next day and the next workload, rather than dreading that “Monday morning.”

1. Employees Will Feel More Creative

An uncomfortable chair can be the number one tool in stifling creativity. A long day of sitting at your desk with your back aching, your neck sore, and dreading every hour that ticks away until you get to go home does not encourage you to think outside the box. Unless something outside the box lets you go home early. An ergonomic chair is designed to mold to your back so that you feel relaxed and comfortable in your seat, and with this comfort comes creativity. These small changes in mood can substantially benefit the speed with which employees work, as well as the quality they produce.

1. Employees Will Avoid Injury Resulting in Time Off

Most office-place injuries are not a result of scalding spilled coffee or spontaneously exploding copy machines; instead, the culprit of most desk-based ailments is chronic back pain, which then manifests in a range of other physical issues. After months and years of sitting in a chair that compromises the integrity of their back, workers’ bodies will be unable to handle the strain. Employees will eventually need to seek medical attention for these issues, which keeps them out of the office and off work for a considerable amount of time. This lack of work cuts into your business’ productivity. Additionally, this costs businesses more than the price of a quality chair, as they will be forced to pay compensation fees and the expenses of health care. In the end, a proper chair not only helps employees, allowing them to produce more, but it also saves money.

While businesses are reluctant to invest in ergonomic chairs due to their cost, it’s important to consider the substantial benefits you are reaping for your level of productivity and for the happiness of your employees in the process. By investing in proper chairs, you will in fact make greater profits while cutting down on the discomfort of your workers, creating a harmonious relationship that each benefit fro

The conference room is used on a frequent basis for meetings with clients and employees. It’s a room where training sessions can be held, presentations can be made and projects can be worked on. In fact, it’s one of the most-used spaces in the entire office, but not all conference rooms are created equally. What you may not realize is that what your conference table is made of as well as the size and shape of it are as important as the meetings you’re holding.

The Conference Table Sets The Tone

First of all, it’s important to understand that the material used to make the conference table is a big deal. You can tell a great deal about a company by the style and tone of the furniture. A lawyer’s office, for example, brings to mind darker wood tones such as walnut or cherry. However, a tech company with high energy employees calls for a lighter table with a maple or light oak finish. Finally, a high-end fashion design company would do well with a sleek, glass-top table. It’s all about matching the table to the culture of the company.

Conference Table Size Does Matter

If you’ve ever been in a small conference room crowded around a large table, you know how uncomfortable and distracting it is. Using a table that’s too big for the room and putting too many people around it are common mistakes. Conference tables, should allow for a good-sized group of people without taking up every inch of floor space. A good rule of thumb would be to leave a wide path completely around the table and remove other items from the room. You should be able to pull a chair out and get in, or out, of it without disturbing the person next to you.

Limit The Number Of Chairs

Although you may have enough room to put 20 people at your conference table, it’s probably not optimal. Seating people too closely to one another creates friction, increases annoyances and creates distractions. It’s best to leave a full space between chairs in order to give each person ample personal space. You may only fit half the people in, but, the meeting will go smoother. In addition, those that attend the meeting will be more likely to pay full attention and be more engaged in the meeting.

Table Shape And Communication

Conference tables come in different shapes for different applications. Some tables have a clear, leadership chair at the head of the table, which are perfect where one person is in charge. There are also round tables, which are excellent for group discussions. Longer, rounded-rectangle tables are also widely used in office settings around the country. Keep in mind that the shape must also suit the size of the room. A round conference table, for instance, won’t work well in a long, narrow room.

If you want to learn more about choosing the right conference table, please contact us. We know a thing or two about them and we’ll be happy to answer any questions you have. If you’re looking for a high-quality table for your conference room, we can help with that too.

With the invention of digital storage, the ability to place untold amounts of information in a hard drive, a cloud, or even flash drives the size of your fingernail have made paper all but irrelevant. You’ve likely heard the many arguments, concerns, and benefits about this digital switch, and the debates rage on, but one fact is clear: digital is better. Not only does it save on space, but it’s faster and most cost-effective. This has motivated businesses of every kind and size to make the switch to digital, abandoning their paper. With this, filing cabinets have become obsolete.

Or have they?

We still live in the physical world, though in a digital culture, and there are many serious advantages to keeping your filing cabinets. Here are five reasons why businesses need to consider hanging on to their filing cabinets — or perhaps even buy more:

1. Not All Businesses Have Made the Digital Switch.

While an unprecedented number of businesses are making the switch to digital, there are still many businesses that are not. This can be for a variety of reasons. Some older businesses are very invested in their paper documents, making it costly to shred or recycle all the paper their bottom line has funded throughout the decades. More modern businesses may not have the budget to purchase the necessary scanners and equipment. So, while you may be going with the times, business-to-business dealings still require you to accommodate your associates’ situation. If your affiliate only sends invoices and other valuable information in paper form, you can’t exactly refuse, can you? You’ll need somewhere to store this information, and a filing cabinet offers the solution.

2. They’re Great for Other Types of Storage.

Filing cabinets are typically used for, well, files, but they also serve the purpose of being compact, stylish, and uniform storage containers for a variety of things. As interesting as it would be, science hasn’t found a way to digitize a stapler, restricting you to the physical, space-consuming original. Office supplies such as staplers, pens, or coffee mugs can all be stashed away into the cabinet to keep your office looking tidy, organized, and running efficiently. Studies have shown that having an organized office not only improves efficiency by eliminating the need to hunt down objects, but also boosts morale, as employees feel more comfortable with the cleanliness. So perhaps you have already moved to digital, but there’s no need to sell the cabinet, as it can store other important objects.

3. It’s Always Good to Have a Backup Plan.

Accidents do happen and acts of cyber terrorism happen even more regularly. Whether it’s the clumsy intern who dumps his coffee on the server or a Mission Impossible villain twirling his mustache as he deletes all your information, the result is the same – your data is lost. Digital storage is more compact — able to hold thousands if not millions of files in a small drive — but this is also a disadvantage. In paper format destroying millions of documents would take a building-wide fire and a great deal of time; in digital, it takes a few-second virus, a small moment of corruption, or a very-very-fired intern to bring it all down.

Having crucial information in paper format offers a backup plan to these situations, and a proper filing cabinet can protect your information when your other copies fail. A fireproof cabinet can withstand a natural disaster and is impervious to hackers. While you’re scrambling to recover your lost digital data, what does your business absolutely need to function? You can avoid going belly-up by having a physical backup of all your essentials, and filing cabinets will keep this all safe.

4. It’s Secure.

In the same way a computer hacker can damage your vital information by getting their hands on it, in this digital age, it has become more and more common for genius-level tech terrorists to steal vital information – whether it be for profit, “social justice,” or simple chaos. For businesses which have vital financial information such as bank numbers and passwords, or employee and customer information like social security numbers, or even private but important information like web passwords, losing this information to the wrong people can be detrimental to your business and to all associated with it. Having physical copies safe in a well-locked filing cabinet will allow you to avoid the risk of a hack altogether. While paper is more costly and slower to share, it boosts security, protects individuals, and creates a peace of mind.

5. It Does Indeed Save Money.

While moving to digital does improve productivity, efficiency, and saves money on purchasing additional paper, ink, and necessary physical storage, if your business was formed and managed before the digital boom, you still have quite a few paper files. Like many businesses, you can recycle these documents, shred them, or have an impromptu office bonfire, but doing so is a loss to your business, as this is money that was once invested and is now being wasted. For the above stated advantages, keeping physical copies can pose an advantage to your business for security reasons, and it also helps for financial reasons. Why call the previous investment a loss? Simply keep ahold of these papers and benefit from the security and the peace of mind, all while keeping that previous investment from being in vain. And once you have made this decision, a filing cabinet is ready to assist.

The move to a digital world is a wise choice in this modern age for a variety of financial and productivity reasons, but that does not mean the paper format has been left behind – or that it should be left behind. We still live in a physical world, and there are many ways that a filing cabinet can benefit you, your business, and your clients, whether you’re embracing the modern age or simply keeping up with the ti