Maintaining a clean and welcoming office environment is vital for remaining productive! Your workers and your visitors need to know they’re in an office that is safe and hygienic, and that means staying on top of cleaning.
Next Level Facility Solutions offers top-tier Louisville, KY, commercial cleaning services. No matter how large or small your workplace is, we can leave it looking and feeling like new! Our services are reasonably priced, and our workforce is highly trained in the best practices for commercial cleanup.
Still, maintaining cleanliness is important. If you won’t have commercial cleaning services visiting your office every day, here are some of our tips for how to keep your office looking great in between professional cleaning efforts.
How To Keep Your Office Looking Clean Year-Round
I. Know the Dirtiest Places in An Office
If you’re not sure where to start, try focusing on the items which are most likely to get dirty. In particular, these are things that are going to be carrying germs and other microbial life. Keeping them clean is vital, especially while the global pandemic is still going.
In our experience, the dirtiest places in an office include:
- Break room sink faucet handles, microwave handles, and door handles
- Bathroom door handles and faucets
- Water fountain and water cooler buttons
- Vending machine keypads
- Keyboards
In other words, aside from keyboards, the dirtiest places are going to be in common areas where lots of people are touching the same objects.
We strongly recommend that these get cleaned daily, or even multiple times daily. Keep bottles of alcohol disinfectant nearby and encourage workers or janitorial teams to periodically spritz commonly-used handles and buttons. It’ll keep the office clean, and hopefully cut down on disease transmission as well.
II. Cleaning Keyboards
On the topic, keyboards may well be the filthiest things in any office. They don’t get cleaned nearly as often as they should and tend to collect everything from grime off people’s fingers, to crumbs from food that can attract insects and bacteria. Ultimately, this is hazardous to users, as well as to the keyboards themselves.
Here are some quick tips for keeping your keyboards clean:
- Regularly invert the keyboard over a trashcan and give it a good shake, or “burp” it by smacking the back, to knock out loose debris.
- Use canned air or pressured aerosol cleaner to knock loose any remaining grime, crumbs, and other contaminants.
- Sticky notes can be used to collect hard-to-reach debris, using the sticky edge to grab particles.
- Don’t forget to clean between the keys, and on their sides. Q-tips dipped in alcohol work well for this.
- Use a disinfectant spray on a paper towel or microfiber cloth the clean the tops of keyboards.
Also, consider getting membranes that go over the top of keyboards. They may look a bit chintzy, but they’re much easier to clean and will extend the lifespan of the keyboards.
III. Cleaning Up a Larger Office Space
The time may come when you or your workforce need to clean their own spaces, particularly if there’s an event such as a party that occurs in between commercial cleaning service calls.
The most important elements to focus on include:
- Dusting. Use microfiber cloths, since these are best at capturing stuck-on dirt and grime. Remember to look at hard-to-reach areas such as behind the computer, and under the desk. This is where dirt is most likely to pile up. If there’s a lot of dust, don’t be afraid to just knock some of it down, then pick it up with vacuuming later.
- Vacuuming. Always work top-to-bottom! That way anything you knock loose can be picked up once you get down to the floor. Be thorough, and make sure to vacuum every surface in the office.
- Disinfecting. Once the primary cleaning is done, do a final pass with disinfectant spray, hitting everything that a person is likely to touch. For a thorough job, you may also want to consider hiring a disinfection service.
You’ll also want to pay attention to a couple of other specific items in the office that tend to get dirty easily.
First, the computer monitor. It’s a very good idea to disconnect the monitor before cleaning, just in case. The screen itself can be cleaned with regular glass cleaner, and either paper towels or microfiber cloth. Don’t forget to clean the sides and back as well – people tend to grab the edges of their monitor a lot, especially for repositioning.
If you’re still using older CRT monitors with vents, be sure to remember the vents as well. They will definitely collect dust. These are best cleaned with a small handheld vacuum, with a brush on the end to knock the dust loose. Compressed air can also help you get at any places too small to easily reach, such as screw holes.
Also, don’t forget the office chairs! For obvious reasons, these can get pretty grimy if they aren’t cleaned regularly. You’ll want to check to see if the chair’s label has any specific cleaning instructions. If so, follow those.
Otherwise, most chairs can be cleaned with a combination of vacuuming and wipe-on cleaning spray. If the chair is water-safe, a spray bottle of water with a few drops of soap will be enough to clean the upholstery. If they aren’t water-safe, use a mixture of rubbing alcohol and a few drops of essential oils.
If you have leather chairs, put a few drops of soap into a half-gallon of water, then use a cloth to wipe small amounts of the solution onto the chairs. Don’t spray them directly; this can saturate the leather and hurt it.
IV. Organization
Finally, it’s good to remember that there’s more to cleaning than just the cleanup itself. Staying tidy will encourage cleanliness, by removing places for dirt to gather and hide. As a few suggestions:
- Don’t allow desks to become too cluttered or have too many “executive time wasters.” It’s easy for these objects to get shoved to the back and end up collecting dust.
- Keep your wiring straight and use zip ties or similar solutions to bundle wires together. This prevents them from turning into a nest or becoming a tripping hazard.
- Have designated places in the office for shared materials such as staplers, hole punches, etc. Encourage employees to promptly return these items to their homes once they’ve been used. (But disinfect them first!)
- Make use of vertical space. Hanging shelves or dividers are far better than putting things on the ground.
- Have plenty of trash cans, easily accessible from every desk. Discourage trash from ever piling up.
- Don’t be afraid to have a “junk drawer” for miscellaneous items since that’s better than letting them pile up. Just be sure to routinely clean this drawer and prevent unnecessary items from stacking up in it.
Keep Your Office Clean with Commercial Cleaning Services from Next Level Facility Solutions
We are Louisville’s premier solution for corporate office cleaning, disinfecting, sanitation, and post-construction/renovation cleanup. If your office has become too difficult to keep clean on your own, we can help – with reasonable prices and a highly professional workforce.
