How often do you clean your workplace? Do you just sweep, vacuum, and wipe down the premises with a Lysol wipe? Sure, this might provide a superficial look that suggests your place is clean on the surface, but it won’t do much for the long-term health of your workplace and workforce. So, how exactly can you ensure your office is hygienic and clean?

Here are the 10 best ways to maintain workplace hygiene:

1. Encourage Sick Days

Yes, there will inevitably be some abuse of this program, but by encouraging sick workers to take a day off, you are doing something for the greater good. Indeed, if even only one person who has come down with a cold or the flu arrives to work, then they could spread it to other people, creating quite the mess.

So, moving forward, you can have a policy where employees are allotted a maximum of two sick days a month. Are you worried about abuse? That’s simple enough: just keep track if someone is abusing the benefit it or not by constantly using up their sick days every month.

One more thing: do not allow workers to bank their sick days.

2. No Perfume Policy

People are more sensitive to smells than ever before, whether it is food or perfumes. Therefore, you should take an active approach to reining in both, particularly perfumes, colognes, body scents, and every other product that is supposed to make you smell like either a rose or someone who is about to go to the club.

Will some decry this as unfair? Yes, well, life isn’t fair – if it were, we wouldn’t get the common cold!

3. Install Hand Sanitizers

What is the best line of defense against bacteria and germs? Hand sanitizers!

Indeed, many of us wash our hands, but it can only clean what is already on your hands. A hand sanitizer, however, will shield your hands against the harmful elements of nature.

While It may be an expense, one of the best ways to keep your workplace hygienic is to install hand sanitizer stations throughout the office, especially in the most frequented areas (front door, break room, bathroom, etc.)

4. Buy Air Fresheners

A terrible odour from the washroom, a rancid lunch tossed in the garbage, and a customer who failed to take a shower in the morning. These are all elements that can leave a lingering smell in your office, which will then ruin the rest of your days. Let’s face it: nobody likes bad smells.

A simple remedy to this common problem is to buy air fresheners and leave them around the office. Like hand sanitizers, you should be leaving air fresheners in the most frequented areas, especially places where there is the likelihood of a bad smell: the kitchen, the bathroom, and near garbage bins.

5. Use Garbage Disposal Systems

Your office has a fire plan, an evacuation plan, and, depending on where you are situated, an earthquake plan. But what about a garbage plan? That’s right. A garbage plan is essential in this day and age to keep your office free of smells, pets, and everything in between.

How do you begin one? Here are some tips:

• Erect disposal units near common sense places.
• Make all your bins visible.
• Don’t place black or blue bins close to employee desks.
• Place signs around the office, notifying workers of disposal.
• Be sure to empty these bins and have them cleaned once in a while.

This is one of the best strategies to employ in your quest to sanitation.

6. Designated Eating Areas

Studies find that most of us eat our workstations. While it is convenient and keeps you working throughout your day, it is unhygienic and bad for your own health. Therefore, it would be a good idea for your office and your employees to institute designated eating areas.

So, if John Smith wants to eat his consommé devilish dish or if Peggy Sue wants to munch on her beef wellington, then they should do so in the designated eating area, also known as the break room.

7. Recommend Daily Showers

Is this uncouth? Perhaps. But it would be a prudent suggestion to the entire workforce – never point to a single person – to take daily showers, either in the morning or evening. You don’t need to hold a company-wide conference and you certainly don’t need to examine how showers are done a la Cosmo Kramer in “Seinfeld,” but friendly reminders that a daily shower can keep the place fresh.

8. Signage for Washing Hands

Many of us don’t know how to properly wash our hands. We dab a little bit of soap, place our hands under warm water for a couple of seconds, rinse, and then dry. It may suffice, but it won’t do much in the long run.

So, wise guy, what’s the correct way of washing your hands?

Here are tips from the Center for Disease Control (CDC) down in the United States:

• Wet your hands with running water (preferably warm) and turn off the tap.
• Apply soap, lather hands by rubbing them together with soap.
• Scrub your hands for at least 20 seconds (sing “Auld Lang Syne”).
• Rinse your hands under warm water.
• Dry your hands with a clean towel or air dry.

Don’t forget the hand sanitizer!

9. Clean Your Windows

Perhaps this is a bit more for aesthetic pleasure but cleaning your windows can transform your office into an oasis. After months of rain showers, blizzards, ice storms, and frigid temperatures complemented by gray, a little bit of light can serve as the greatest disinfectant. It can raise our spirits, provide a new eye for what is really dirty, and make your office look cleaner when it is cleaned.

10. Hire a Cleaning Crew

In the end, the best way to ensure your workplace is clean to the best of its abilities is to hire a cleaning crew. A professional cleaning company has equipment you don’t have, has the ability to clean places you cannot, and has the will to make sure you have the cleanest office on the block.

By doing this, you can prevent the spread of germs, surprise visitors with how clean your workspace is, and improve the mood of workers – who likes to work in filth? It’s an investment, but it’s a worthwhile one.

Every office needs to be spic and span. If it isn’t, then you will have surly workers, an outbreak of colds and flus, and lower productivity levels. Before you know, cockroaches, mice, and perhaps even bed bugs are prevalent at work. So, what’s the solution? Make sanitation at the top of your list of things to do. It might not seem as important as balancing the books or nabbing that client from Malaysia, but a clean workplace is a happy workplace.