Everyone who has ever worked in a professional environment has stories to tell about messy office kitchens, dirty fridges and stained, disgusting microwaves. Moreover, such conditions can cause one to lose one’s appetite and can even facilitate the spread of diseases. To help you achieve a cleaner, more sanitary office kitchen, here are 6 policies you may wish to implement immediately.
- Develop guidelines: Develop a comprehensive list of office kitchen policies and post them prominently in the break-room and/or kitchen. Make sure that you highlight rules that are of particular importance. Also, be sure to get employee input in forming these rules.
- Create a calendar: Develop a schedule of kitchen duties so that employees know when it is there time to perform tasks such as loading and unloading the dishwasher, cleaning the refrigerator, etc.
- Never leave dirty dishes or silverware in the sink: Instruct employees to wash their dishes immediately after using them rather than letting them pile up in the sink. Dirty dishes are unsightly, unsanitary and can attract pests.
- Empty garbage bins frequently: Make sure that trash bins are emptied before they start to overflow. Assign someone to do this on a regular basis in order to prevent the transmission of strong odors.
- Throw away spoiled and/or rotten food: We all know that touching someone else’s food in the fridge is a no-no. The exception is when that food is obviously rotting or spoiled. First, inform the person whose food it is. Then, make sure that it is taken to an outside dumpster so as not to create offensive odors in the kitchen/break room.
- Stress personal responsibility: Make sure that employees know that they are responsible as individuals for cleaning up after themselves. You may assign someone to oversee these tasks collectively but each employee should contribute to the upkeep of this common area.
- Develop specific microwave usage rules: Here are a few: Don’t leave burned popcorn in the microwave, clean up after making a mess, cover items that are prone to splatter with a paper towel, etc.
We expect cleanliness and order from the office kitchen above all other areas of the workplace. Exec Services does office cleaning in Riverside, CA which can make your office kitchen immaculate. We also offer commercial window cleaning services in Riverside CA as well as carpet cleaning and day porter services.