We're moving offices. How do we move our IT without chaos?

The single biggest office-move mistake is treating internet like electricity, something that is simply on when you arrive. A new business circuit at a new address routinely takes 30 to 90 days to install, longer if the building needs construction or fiber has not reached the street. So the first IT phone call happens when the lease is signed, not when the boxes are packed: order the circuit, and have your IT provider walk the new space before the floor plan is final. That walkthrough decides where the network closet goes (power, ventilation, a door that locks), how many network drops each area needs, and where wireless access points and cameras belong. Running cable before the drywall closes costs a fraction of retrofitting after.

The move itself is a sequence designed so nobody works without a network. The new site's firewall, switches, and access points get configured and installed while the old office is still running, so the network is alive and tested before a single desk arrives. Cloud systems and VoIP phones make this dramatically easier (they need nothing but working internet at the new address), which is one more argument for shedding the on-premise dependencies before a move rather than hauling them. Then the cutover: shut down Friday evening, move and reconnect Saturday, and spend Sunday testing every workstation, printer, and payment device. The Monday-morning emergencies all come from skipping the Sunday test.

Expect your MSP to act as the project manager, not just the cable-plugger: coordinating the internet provider, the cabling contractor, phones, and door access on one timeline, keeping a cutover checklist, and decommissioning the old space properly (equipment collected, drives accounted for, circuits cancelled, ideally with a week of overlap as a safety net). A move is also the natural moment to fix what you have been tolerating: the aging server, the rats-nest closet, the Wi-Fi dead zones. You are already touching everything; upgrading during the move costs far less than a separate project later.