Office Fit-Outs in Leeds: Getting the Network Right First Time
A new office is one of the best opportunities a business gets to build its IT properly.
The walls are open.
Desks haven't been fixed in place.
Meeting rooms are still being designed.
Cabling routes are accessible.
The broadband hasn't been installed yet.
And nobody has had the chance to create a mysterious cupboard full of switches, extension leads and cables labelled “DO NOT UNPLUG.”
Unfortunately, IT is often brought into an office fit-out far too late.
The furniture is ordered.
The decorators have finished.
The desks are installed.
Then somebody asks:
“Where are the network points going?”
For businesses fitting out new offices in Leeds, getting the network design right at the beginning can prevent years of Wi-Fi problems, expensive alterations and frustrating workarounds.
The network isn't simply another component of the office.
It is the infrastructure that almost everything else depends on.
Your Network Should Be Planned Before the Desks Arrive
A modern office can contain far more connected technology than people realise.
It isn't just computers.
You may have:
- Laptops and desktops
- Wireless access points
- VoIP phones
- Printers and scanners
- Meeting-room equipment
- CCTV
- Door-access systems
- Televisions and displays
- Building-management equipment
- Servers or storage
- Payment devices
- Guest Wi-Fi
- Mobile phones and tablets
- Internet-connected equipment
A 30-person Leeds office might therefore have considerably more than 30 devices using the network.
Designing infrastructure based purely on current employee numbers is one of the easiest ways to outgrow it.
Your office network should support the company you expect to become, not just the number of desks you have today.
1. Start With the Floor Plan
Before ordering switches or Wi-Fi equipment, understand the building.
Where will employees sit?
Where are the meeting rooms?
Reception?
Breakout spaces?
Boardroom?
Printer areas?
Communications room?
CCTV?
Access-control equipment?
Are teams likely to expand?
Will desks be fixed or flexible?
The floor plan allows the network to be designed around how the building will actually be used.
This is much better than installing a few data points approximately where somebody thinks they might be useful.
Think About Tomorrow's Layout Too
Suppose you currently have 25 employees but the office can accommodate 45.
Designing the network for exactly 25 people probably isn't sensible.
Adding cabling while walls and ceilings are accessible is relatively straightforward.
Adding it after everything has been decorated can be considerably more disruptive.
A small amount of additional capacity during the fit-out can save substantial work later.
2. Don't Let the Electrician Decide the Entire Network
Electricians are essential to an office fit-out.
But structured networking is its own discipline.
We've seen environments where network sockets have been installed beautifully but:
They terminate in the wrong place.
Nobody knows which socket corresponds with which port.
Access points are positioned according to cable convenience rather than wireless coverage.
There aren't enough network points.
The cable specification isn't appropriate.
There is no sensible cabinet design.
Or everything works initially but is impossible to maintain later.
IT and electrical contractors should work together.
Your electrician installs the physical infrastructure.
Your IT team defines what that infrastructure needs to achieve.
Label Everything
This sounds boring.
Do it anyway.
Every network point should be identifiable.
Every patch-panel port should correspond clearly with the socket at the desk.
Cabling should be tested.
Documentation should be retained.
When a problem occurs three years later, an engineer should be able to identify the relevant port without tracing a cable through the ceiling.
Good documentation costs very little during installation.
Poor documentation costs time forever afterwards.
3. Build a Proper Communications Cabinet
The network cabinet is often treated as somewhere to hide IT equipment.
It should be treated as infrastructure.
Depending on the office, it may contain:
Internet equipment.
Firewall.
Network switches.
Patch panels.
Fibre termination.
UPS equipment.
Servers.
Telephone equipment.
CCTV infrastructure.
The cabinet needs appropriate:
Space.
Power.
Ventilation.
Physical security.
Cable management.
Accessibility.
Future expansion capacity.
Do not design a network cabinet that is already full on the day the office opens.
And avoid placing critical network equipment somewhere that doubles as a cleaning cupboard.
Network switches and bottles of bleach are not natural partners.
4. Get the Internet Ordered Early
This is one of the most important items on the entire office fit-out checklist.
Business connectivity can have significant installation lead times.
You do not want to discover two weeks before the Leeds office opens that the fibre connection hasn't been ordered.
Before committing to the final network design, establish:
What connectivity is available.
Expected installation times.
Required bandwidth.
Whether a dedicated business connection is appropriate.
What resilience is needed.
Where the service will enter the building.
Where the provider's equipment will terminate.
The location of the internet termination can influence the design of the entire communications area.
Consider a Backup Connection
If your business is dependent on cloud services, losing internet access can effectively close the office.
Employees may lose:
Microsoft 365.
Cloud applications.
VoIP.
SharePoint.
Hosted systems.
Customer platforms.
Remote connectivity.
A secondary internet service or appropriately designed 4G/5G failover can therefore be worthwhile.
The more dependent the organisation becomes on cloud technology, the more important connectivity resilience becomes.
5. Wi-Fi Needs Designing, Not Guessing
This is one of the most common office-fit-out mistakes.
Somebody looks at the floor plan and says:
“We'll put one access point there and another one over there.”
That isn't wireless design.
Wi-Fi performance is influenced by:
Walls.
Glass.
Metal.
Floor construction.
Furniture.
Interference.
Neighbouring wireless networks.
Device density.
Access-point placement.
Meeting-room usage.
The number of simultaneous users.
Even the materials used during the fit-out can affect wireless performance.
More Access Points Doesn't Automatically Mean Better Wi-Fi
You can have too much Wi-Fi equipment.
Poorly positioned access points can interfere with each other.
The objective isn't to install the maximum number possible.
It's to create appropriate coverage and capacity.
A proper design considers both.
Your boardroom, for example, may have 15 people simultaneously joining a video call.
That is very different from a corridor where nobody uses a laptop.
Design around usage rather than square footage alone.
6. Don't Forget Meeting Rooms
Meeting-room technology is now part of network design.
A modern meeting room might include:
Teams or Zoom equipment.
Camera.
Microphones.
Speakers.
Wireless presentation.
Room-booking panel.
Television or display.
VoIP functionality.
Occupancy equipment.
Some of those devices need Ethernet.
Others use Wi-Fi.
All need reliable connectivity.
Plan the network before the table is installed, otherwise you may end up with expensive meeting-room equipment running through a cable stretched across the carpet.
Hybrid Meetings Raise the Standard
Hybrid working means the meeting-room experience matters more than ever.
If half the participants are remote, poor audio or unreliable connectivity doesn't just annoy people in the room.
It affects everyone.
A well-designed meeting room should make joining and participating simple.
Nobody wants the first ten minutes of every client meeting to involve:
“Can anyone get the screen working?”
7. Segment the Network
Not everything should necessarily sit on the same network.
Depending on the environment, separate networks may be appropriate for:
Corporate devices.
Guest Wi-Fi.
VoIP.
CCTV.
Building systems.
Servers.
Internet-of-Things devices.
This improves both management and security.
Your visitor connecting to guest Wi-Fi shouldn't automatically share the same level of network access as an employee laptop.
Neither should an inexpensive smart device necessarily sit next to business-critical infrastructure.
Network segmentation needs designing before deployment rather than being added as an afterthought.
8. Think About Power Over Ethernet
Power over Ethernet — commonly called PoE — allows compatible devices to receive both network connectivity and electrical power through the same Ethernet cable.
This is particularly useful for:
Wireless access points.
VoIP phones.
CCTV cameras.
Door-access equipment.
Some display and building systems.
It can simplify installation significantly.
But your switches need enough PoE capacity to power everything.
That means calculating requirements rather than buying whichever network switch happens to have the correct number of ports.
Count Ports Properly
If you have 30 employees, don't automatically buy a 48-port switch and assume you're covered.
You may also need ports for:
Access points.
Printers.
CCTV cameras.
Servers.
Firewalls.
Phones.
Meeting rooms.
Door-access equipment.
Uplinks.
Additional devices.
Then add capacity for growth.
Your port requirements can quickly become considerably higher than your desk count.
9. Your Firewall Is Part of the Fit-Out
The internet connection shouldn't simply plug directly into the office network.
A suitable business firewall forms an important part of your security infrastructure.
Depending on the environment, it can help provide:
Traffic filtering.
Network segmentation.
VPN services.
Security monitoring.
Threat protection.
Access control.
Internet failover.
The correct firewall needs to be sized for the actual internet connection and required security services.
A device that handled a 100 Mbps connection perfectly well may not deliver the same performance on a much faster circuit once advanced security inspection is enabled.
Design it as part of the network rather than ordering one at the last minute.
10. Think About Cyber Security From Day One
A new office is the perfect opportunity to establish a clean security baseline.
Don't simply rebuild every old weakness at the new premises.
Review:
Network segmentation.
Firewall configuration.
Guest Wi-Fi.
Administrative credentials.
Switch management.
Wireless security.
Remote access.
Firmware.
Unsupported network equipment.
Physical access to infrastructure.
The Buff IT Guy has a simple rule here:
Don't carry the weak equipment into the new gym.
If you're investing in a new office, this is the right time to replace infrastructure that has already reached the end of its sensible life.
A beautiful new Leeds office connected through an ancient firewall and unsupported switch isn't a modern workplace.
It's old IT wearing new carpet.
11. Allow for Hybrid Working
Office networking now has to coexist with employees working elsewhere.
You may have:
People permanently based in Leeds.
Employees splitting time between home and office.
Remote staff elsewhere in Yorkshire.
Teams joining from across the UK.
The office network therefore needs to support cloud-first working.
Microsoft 365.
Teams meetings.
SharePoint.
OneDrive.
Cloud applications.
Hosted VoIP.
Secure remote-access systems.
This can dramatically increase bandwidth requirements compared with an old environment where most applications ran from a local server.
Thirty people on simultaneous video calls consume network capacity very differently from thirty people using Word and email.
12. Don't Forget Mobile Coverage
Your new office may have fantastic Wi-Fi and terrible mobile reception.
Modern construction materials can significantly weaken mobile signals indoors.
That matters because employees use mobiles for:
Calls.
MFA.
Teams.
Emergency communication.
Testing mobile apps.
Depending on the building and requirements, Wi-Fi calling or other options may help.
It is worth testing before employees move in rather than discovering the issue afterwards.
13. Coordinate IT With the Other Fit-Out Contractors
An office fit-out usually involves multiple suppliers:
Landlord.
Builder.
Electrician.
Furniture provider.
Interior designer.
Cabling contractor.
Internet provider.
Telephone provider.
Security company.
IT provider.
Problems occur when nobody coordinates them.
The cabinet ends up somewhere unsuitable.
Furniture blocks network sockets.
The Wi-Fi access point is hidden above metal ducting.
The meeting-room screen has power but no network cable.
The fibre arrives on the opposite side of the building from the comms cabinet.
Getting IT involved early allows technical requirements to become part of the overall fit-out plan.
That prevents expensive rework later.
14. Test Before Move-In Day
The day employees arrive should not be the first real test of the network.
Before the office goes live, test:
Internet connectivity.
Failover connectivity.
Ethernet ports.
Wi-Fi coverage.
Guest Wi-Fi.
Firewall configuration.
Microsoft 365 access.
Teams calls.
VoIP.
Printers.
Meeting rooms.
Remote access.
Business applications.
CCTV or access systems where appropriate.
Ideally, test from the desks employees will actually use.
A network can look perfect from the communications cabinet while the far meeting room has barely usable Wi-Fi.
Load Matters Too
Testing one laptop at 10am on an empty Friday isn't the same as running the network with 50 employees.
Consider how the office will behave under normal load.
This is particularly important for:
Wireless networks.
Internet connections.
VoIP.
Teams and video conferencing.
The objective is not simply:
“It connects.”
It's:
“It performs properly when the business is busy.”
15. Document the Finished Network
When the office opens, retain a useful network record.
That might include:
Cabinet layout.
Patch-panel information.
Network diagrams.
Switch configuration.
Access-point locations.
Wi-Fi configuration.
Firewall details.
Internet circuits.
IP addressing.
VLANs.
Warranty information.
Supplier information.
You should be able to understand the infrastructure without relying on the memory of whoever installed it.
That makes future troubleshooting, expansion and upgrades significantly easier.
The Buff IT Guy's Office Fit-Out Workout
The Buff IT Guy would never start a serious workout by building the gym around the equipment after everyone had arrived.
He'd plan first.
How much weight does it need to handle?
Where does the equipment go?
Is there enough room to grow?
Are the foundations strong?
Your network deserves exactly the same thinking.
The best office network is not the one containing the most expensive equipment.
It's the one that:
Fits the business.
Performs reliably.
Is secure.
Can be supported.
And has enough capacity for growth.
You shouldn't have to rip open freshly decorated walls twelve months later because nobody thought about the network during the fit-out.
How Hamilton Group Can Help With Leeds Office Fit-Outs
Hamilton Group can help Leeds businesses plan and implement the IT infrastructure behind a new office or refurbishment.
Rather than arriving at the end of the project to connect some computers, we can become involved during the planning stage.
That can include:
Network design
Planning switches, cabinets, network segmentation and connectivity around the actual office.
Structured cabling requirements
Working with fit-out and electrical contractors to make sure the right network infrastructure is installed in the right places.
Business broadband
Helping establish connectivity requirements and plan installation before move-in.
Business Wi-Fi
Designing wireless coverage and capacity for the users, devices and meeting spaces within the building.
Firewalls and cyber security
Building security into the network rather than adding it afterwards.
Microsoft 365
Making sure cloud services, Teams and remote-working systems perform properly from the new environment.
VoIP and business telephony
Planning phones, call routing and internet requirements alongside the wider network.
Meeting-room technology
Helping ensure collaborative spaces have the connectivity they need.
Server and cloud infrastructure
Planning any onsite equipment while identifying workloads that may be better moved into the cloud.
Managed IT support
Continuing to support the environment after the contractors have packed up and the office has opened.
Hamilton Group is based in Harrogate and supports businesses throughout Leeds and Yorkshire, giving local organisations access to both remote support and engineers who can attend onsite when infrastructure needs hands-on attention.
Why Bring Hamilton Group in Early?
Because fixing something on a floor plan is considerably easier than fixing it after the office is finished.
Moving an access point on a drawing takes seconds.
Moving it after ceilings are complete is another job.
Adding two network points during installation is straightforward.
Adding them after desks and partitions are fitted is not.
Changing the location of a network cabinet before construction costs almost nothing.
Discovering afterwards that the cabinet has inadequate ventilation can become considerably more expensive.
Good IT planning can therefore save money even before the first employee connects a laptop.
Building a New Office in Leeds?
If you're planning a new Leeds office, refurbishing existing premises or moving into a larger space, get IT involved while decisions can still be changed easily.
Hamilton Group can work with your fit-out contractors, electricians, broadband providers and internal team to make sure the technology infrastructure is designed properly from the start.
The objective is straightforward.
On the first morning in the new office:
The internet works.
The Wi-Fi works.
Teams works.
Phones work.
Meeting rooms work.
Employees connect.
And nobody has to ask why the brand-new £2 million office has terrible Wi-Fi.
The Buff IT Guy would call that a strong foundation.
We'd simply call it doing the job properly.
Call Hamilton Group on 0330 043 0069
Email: hello@hgmssp.com
Visit: hgmssp.com
If you're planning an office fit-out in Leeds, talk to Hamilton Group before the walls are closed and the desks arrive. It is much easier to get the network right first time than spend the next five years working around it.