Once you have shortlisted a few office fit-out companies, the difficult part begins. Most will have strong portfolios, experienced teams and convincing presentations.
The final decision should not come down to who has the best-looking projects or the lowest price. It should come down to one question:
Which partner gives you the most confidence that they understand your project, your business and what could make the job difficult?
Use the questions below as a simple decision guide.
Ask yourself: have they solved a problem like ours before?
Don't just look for projects of a similar size. Check whether they have dealt with similar challenges.
If your project involves a live working environment, specialist facilities, a tight programme or significant infrastructure upgrades, ask to see proof of that specifically.
Habit Action's Atlas Copco headquarters project, for example, involved office, workshop and warehouse environments within a major 55,000 sq ft transformation.
The important question isn't: "Have they completed a £5m office?"
It is: "Have they dealt with the things that will make our project difficult?"
Ask yourself: do they understand why we're doing the project?
A good fit-out partner should understand more than your floorplan. They should understand what the project needs to change for the business.
Are you bringing teams together? Supporting growth? Improving the client experience? Creating more specialist space? Trying to attract people back into the workplace?
Check whether they are asking about those things.
If they move straight into finishes, furniture and layouts without properly understanding the business case, they may be solving the wrong problem.
If your project is still at this earlier stage, our guide to what large organisations should assess before workplace strategy is a useful starting point.
Ask yourself: are they challenging us in the right places?
The best partner will not necessarily agree with everything in your brief.
They may challenge your programme.
They may question whether you need as many desks as you think.
They may flag that the budget does not align with the specification.
That is often a good sign. Ask: "What would you change about our current plan?"
Then listen carefully to the answer. You want a partner who is prepared to identify problems before they become expensive ones.
Check who will actually deliver the project
The people in the pitch room are not always the people you work with afterwards. Before making a decision, check who your day-to-day contacts will be.
Who owns the design?
Who manages construction?
Who deals with cost and programme?
Who makes decisions when something goes wrong?
Most importantly, meet those people. You are likely to be working closely with them for months, so the relationship matters just as much as the company credentials.
Ask them: what worries you about our project?
This is one of the most revealing questions you can ask. Every major fit-out has risk.
It could be services, approvals, long-lead items, building access, programme, IT, phasing or simply too many decisions being left too late.
If a potential partner cannot identify any risks, they probably have not looked closely enough.
Check whether they can explain:
What is the risk?
Why does it matter?
What should we do about it now?
That tells you far more than being told everything will run smoothly.
Check whether their experience matches your type of workplace
Not every headquarters is just an office.
Some include workshops, laboratories, warehouses, demonstration areas, production facilities or secure environments.
If that applies to your organisation, check that your partner understands those spaces as well as the workplace around them.
Habit Action's Shoal Group headquarters, for example, combines around 15,000 sq ft of office space with approximately 70,000 sq ft of warehouse space.
Likewise, the Essex X-Ray headquarters combines workplace, warehouse and specialist technical environments.
If your building has specialist requirements, ask for proof that the team has dealt with them before.
Ask yourself: can they turn the design into something deliverable?
Good design matters. But so do cost, programme, building constraints and technical feasibility.
Check how closely their designers, pre-construction team and delivery team work together.
Ask: "At what point do you test whether the design can actually be built within our budget and programme?"
The earlier this happens, the fewer surprises you are likely to face later.
For more on how this sits within the wider project, see our guide to how large organisations should plan an office fit-out.
Check the evidence behind the portfolio
Don't stop at photographs. Ask what actually changed for the client.
Did the project allow them to grow?
Bring teams together?
Improve the employee experience?
Create more operational capacity?
Support a new way of working?
For Atlas Copco, the completed headquarters supported a 30% increase in office occupancy and created 40% more workshop capacity.
Those outcomes tell you much more about the project than the finishes alone.
Ask yourself: are we comparing the prices properly?
Two quotes can look similar while including very different things. Before deciding one company is cheaper, check the scope.
What is excluded?
What is provisional?
What assumptions have been made?
Has one contractor allowed for something another has missed?
The lowest number is only genuinely lower if everyone is pricing the same project.
Check how they will protect business continuity
If your organisation needs to keep operating during the works, this should be a major part of the decision.
Ask: "How exactly will you work around our business?"
If the answer is simply "we'll phase it", keep asking.
You want to understand how people, services, access, noisy works and critical operations will actually be managed.
Ask yourself: do we trust this team when something changes?
Because something will.
A project can begin with a strong brief and still encounter changes along the way.
A building can reveal surprises.
A decision can be delayed.
A product can suddenly have a longer lead time.
A stakeholder can change their mind.
The real test of a fit-out partner is not whether everything goes perfectly. It is how they respond when it doesn't.
Ask yourself:
Do they communicate clearly?
Do they tell us about problems early?
Do they bring solutions, not just issues?
Would we trust them to make a difficult decision with us?
That is often what separates two otherwise very similar fit-out companies.
A simple final check
Before appointing an office fit-out partner, you should be able to answer yes to most of these questions:
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Do they understand why we're doing the project?
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Have they solved similar problems before?
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Do we know who will actually deliver it?
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Have they identified the main risks?
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Can they prove their technical capability?
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Is the programme realistic?
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Is the commercial proposal clear?
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Can they work around our business?
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Do we trust the team when something changes?
If several of those answers are unclear, you probably need to ask more questions before making the appointment.
The partner should fit the project
There is no single "best" office fit-out company. There is a partner that is better suited to your particular project, business and constraints.
The strongest decision will usually come from looking beyond presentations and comparing the evidence: relevant experience, project team, technical capability, risk management and how well they understand what your organisation is actually trying to achieve.
If you're still building the wider project plan, read our guide to how to plan a large corporate office fit-out.
If you are earlier in the selection process, our existing guide to how large organisations should choose an office fit-out partner covers what to look for when creating the shortlist.
