Midland Heart

Birmingham-based staff at housing support provider Midland Heart are enjoying refreshed and improved office space after Novus Property Solutions installed new office layouts and kitchen breakout areas at the company’s headquarters.

As well as adding the new layouts and relaxation zones, refurbishment specialists Novus carried out a full refit of the main reception area at Midland Heart’s main office on Bath Row in Birmingham. The work has created a greater choice of meeting spaces in the building and also ensured better space utilisation by removing or altering internal partitions.

The refurbishment project, which ran from August through to December and was worth more than £350,000, also involved an office fit-out and damp works at two other commercial units owned and managed by Midland Heart, and the creation of a number of small office touchdown points at various locations around the Midlands to support a move to more flexible working and reduce the cost of Midland Heart’s offices portfolio.

The project required careful scheduling and consideration for staff working in the buildings affected, as Novus Contracts Manager Jason Bowen explained.

“All the buildings we worked on remained fully operational throughout the refurbishments,” he said. “Sound barriers were erected in an attempt to reduce noise levels affecting staff in the Midland Heart Call Centre.

“Where this was not achievable, weekend and night work was scheduled to ensure staff disruption was kept to a minimum and the day-to-day functionality of the centre was maintained.”

Project Sponsor and Midland Heart director Andrew Foster commented: “We are very pleased with the work Novus did for us across a number of locations, which has given us good quality and flexible office space at a competitive price.

“The Novus team worked effectively with the in-house team to plan and execute the work and to keep to a minimum any operational impact of the works being done. That this was achieved while ensuring that the work was done on time and to budget is a credit to the Novus team and I am grateful for their efforts.”