March 2020 was a shock to us all. The whole world came to a standstill overnight whilst the country grappled with the horrors of COVID-19.
But as the summer of 2020 continued, it was clear that, particularly for schools, installing cabling and upgrading their network infrastructure was not high on the agenda. Jump forward twelve months to 2021 and the shoots of spring were beginning to grow, together with a realisation from many schools and businesses that they needed to catch up.
Although this was great news for Officeworx and plenty of projects now needed to be completed, it brought with it the issue of timescales for installation and sourcing of equipment. Particularly for schools, this meant having to squeeze all the work into their holidays. With schools being a large part of our customer base, it meant we were left with about an 8 week window of opportunity to complete all the installations.
Having juggled our engineering resource to ensure we could meet the timescales; the next problem came when we started to order the equipment required for the installations. Sometimes it felt as if the whole world was against us. The first issue came when kit was in restraint and when we did manage to source, it didn’t turn up as promised. The boat stuck in the Suez Canal, coupled with the many delivery drivers who were isolating due to COVID-19 proved quite a struggle. And, if that wasn’t enough of a challenge to overcome, we had other schools during the holidays calling about work that they had forgotten and needed completing urgently!
I was proud to be part of a team of engineers who took these hiccups in their stride and continued to meet all of the deadlines set by the schools on time. – Martin Croucher – Engineer
One of the most interesting things about what we do here at Officeworx, is the varied nature of the installations we come across – it certainly keeps us on our toes! It could be as simple as a single network cable to a new wireless access point or camera or a new interactive whiteboard and TV screens to enable students a better environment in which to learn. We have also been involved in designing and installing a complete fibre optic backbone for a few schools. All of these, of course, were completed in a safe and socially distant matter.
