Ah, technology. Thou art making our lives different.
Communication is the number 1 driver of change historically both across society and the workplace. The rise of phone calls allowed offices to be spread out nationally. The rise of email allowed for faster, more official communication globally. The rise of instant messaging created the ability for real time extended collaboration. The rise of cell phones detached workers from their desks. The rise of smartphones accelerated all the above.
So what happens to the office when every employee has the ability to communicate instantly with any other employee?
- Office layouts no longer influence extra-departmental communication – but it can hamper it.
- Employees will get their job done regardless of the office environment.
- If employees don’t like their seat, they’ll find another place to work from (inside or outside of the office).
- Schedules become increasingly flexible.
Take these to the logical conclusion and the office design process must change. Collaboration has been the buzzword around workplace and architectural circles but that’s only part of the answer. Hoteling/hot desking is also only part of the puzzle – human nature will still dictate that employees have “their” seat.
Now the important decisions for office design focus on:
- Making it easy for employees to meet and communicate/work face-to-face. As mobile technology improves, face-to-face meetings will take on additional value even if they happen less frequently.
- Ignore departmental boundaries – focus on work flow and intra-office communication (yes, it’s as hard to do as it sounds).
- Make it easy and convenient to walk around the office. If collaboration is encouraged, then transportation throughout the workplace should be easy and convenient.
- Define quiet areas for heads down work. Not everyone wants collaboration every day, they should have a place for themselves.
- Don’t block “productivity killing” websites such as ESPN, Facebook, Twitter, and the like. If an employee wants to browse them they will on their own smartphone. The only thing you are doing is making them take more time to do it by switching devices and breaking their work flow. (Yes, technology infrastructure is part of office design.)
- Decide if private offices really are necessary. Sometimes the answer is yes but often it is no.
Some of these are traditional but the context of them is now different. Start with the assumption that you don’t know what employees do for their job. From there your design principles must be to encourage flexibility and that employees will do what is best for their job.