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Increased Retention/Reduced Turnover
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21st Century Work Habitats
Technology gives people mobility so they can work anywhere. Collaboration and the innovation it can spur call for places where people can come together. Attracting skilled, talented people is critically important, but so is creating spaces that keep them engaged. Multiple generations--each with its own ideas about how to work--share the same workplace. As these and other realities shape 21st-century work habitats, the industry that designs them faces new challenges. For some perspective on how these challenges are being met, Herman Miller spoke with four Chicago-based designers from the architecture and design firm Gensler. In this wide-ranging discussion, they speak about what they're experiencing and what they foresee.
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Environmental Responsibility
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Campus Sustainability
The influences of sustainability efforts, large or small, can change a student's educational experience, a staff or faculty member's commitment to the college, and a community's awareness of its ecological responsibility. Sustainability initiatives seen on college and university campuses throughout the country are influencing curriculum decisions, operations budgets, facility plans, and campus culture. Students, faculty, and staff are leading the efforts. They often find it to be difficult work, requiring the kind of campus-wide coordination and cooperation that's often absent from the organizational structure of higher education institutions. Yet while the approaches and participants vary, all share a common motivation--to do the right thing.
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Forward Thinking
In the nearly 40 years since Robert Propst wrote The Office: A Facility Based on Change, what has become of his ideas? His study of offices found "it is our buildings, furnishings, and services that have to be revisualized and revitalized." That required an approach for addressing what Propst called the new master in organizations--constant, rapid change. For Propst, this meant new rules for the office: a "forgiving" behavior in facility design; the ability to change with "grace"; putting more control in the hands of the person working in the space. While these rules have been unevenly applied and sometimes misused in the intervening years, they continue to resonate even as work and work environments evolve. Built on Propst's original thoughts, two additional rules address the new office landscape apparent today: Give people choice and variety in how they create and share; enrich their work experience with a workplace that is flexible and open to change and serendipity.
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Measures of Success
Is it possible to measure the degree to which a physical place supports people's concentration, use of technology, and ability to work collaboratively? Researchers at Herman Miller demonstrate that it is. And they add that it's essential for organizations to regularly gauge the contribution "place" can make toward realizing an organization's strategic objectives. This research summary looks at the results of several studies that measure the effect of the workplace on business outcomes. The findings provide an empirical rationale for taking a strategic approach to selecting and using facilities and office furniture.
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Flexibility/Ease of Change
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Mobile Workers
Among knowledge workers, the switch from a tethered workforce--one that keeps traditional hours in a traditional workplace--to a new, mobile model is already in progress around the world. These employees will be working in places ranging from home offices to nearby coffeehouses, from guest workstations to team spaces. Laptop computers, wireless networks, and cell phones made the initial shift to mobility possible, but as larger groups of workers are untethered, IT departments will be addressing additional challenges. Companies will also need to prepare for corporate culture changes and make sure their management employees have the skills necessary to guide mobile workers and their project-team work style. These adjustments will be well worth making, because large productivity gains, significant facility savings, and even environmental benefits will result from shifting to a more mobile work model.
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Three-Dimensional
Branding: Using Space as a Medium for the Message
With a distinct brand image, companies can break free
from the me-too morass that bogs down so many product
and service categories, staking their claim to a firm
market position competitors can't approach. While many
companies look at brand building as a marketing challenge
alone, others realize they have to live their brand,
not just promote it. And the surest way to do that is
by weaving brand building throughout the entire organization
- even the office environment. Think of it as three-dimensional
branding, the idea that physical space can be a critical
medium for communicating the message.
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Mutual Attraction, How to Get the Attention of Top Performers Who Fit:
In the coming years, it's going to be tough to find enough workers to fill all the jobs vacated by retiring baby boomers and tougher still to attract the right "top performers" that make an organization great. Companies are taking action, positioning themselves as desirable places to work by building their employer brand. A strong corporate culture and consistent communication about that culture are prerequisites to success. |
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When Work and Life Balance, Everyone Wins:
Companies in some developed countries are facing a labor shortage. One way they can attract and retain workers is by helping them achieve a better work-life balance, an issue that cuts across social and geographical borders. Some companies have responded by offering flextime, telecommuting, and a compressed workweek, for example. In one study of 29 American firms, offering flexibility to workers had a positive impact on the companies' bottom lines in a variety of ways. However, formal work-life balance programs and even legislation aren't likely to be effective unless the corporate culture is conducive to work-life balance. So far, smaller companies have been more adept at work-life balance initiatives than larger ones, perhaps because it's easier for managers at small companies to see how flexibility works for both the company and the worker. |
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Learning
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A
View of the Changing Campus: How Learning Environment
Can Support Changes in Higher Education
The leaders of universities
and colleges in the U.S. are discovering that image
is critical in attracting and retaining students. They
are beginning to see the campus environment as a strategic
tool they can use to compete and differentiate. This
realization comes against the backdrop of changing patterns
of behavior, learning, and instruction; increasing competition
for students and faculty; and aging facilities. In order
to support a new learning paradigm, one in which an
institution produces learning with every student by
whatever means work best, learning environments must
be adaptable and flexible. The challenge in designing,
planning, and furnishing these spaces becomes to support
multiple uses and different types of learning activities.
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Acoustics
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It's
a Matter of Balance: New Understandings of Open Plan
Acoustics
It's been thirty years now. Thirty years since the first
open-plan work spaces started replacing individual enclosed
offices as a standard in the American workplace. Thirty
years of progressively more compact workstations in
progressively more densely populated work areas. Thirty
years of office workers (as many as one in four, according
to a recent British survey) variously complaining about
the acoustics in their workstations. |
Applications
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New
Directions in Call Center Design: Demanding Challenges
for a Complex Workplace
Today's call centers have
evolved to become sophisticated, high-tech showcases
of service, support, and sales. For companies that interact
with customers primarily through their call center,
it is often the only opportunity they have to build
a relationship with customers. Aside from customers
and the corporation at large, call centers need to serve
the people who work there, too. Many of them are highly
educated, highly sought after workers with a command
of both technology and interpersonal communications.
A comfortable, well-designed workplace can go a long
way toward attracting these agents and keeping them
on the job. Strategies for accomplishing this include
planning for inevitable changes and more technology,
achieving density without sacrificing comfort, making
use of natural light and views to the outside, and providing
furnishings that adjust to support personal preferences.
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Making
Teamwork Work: Designing Spaces that Support Collaborative
Efforts
'Teams' and 'struggle' are two words I hear a lot,"
say a researcher who has listened to managers, facility
planners, and team members from a number of types of
companies talk about their efforts to promote and support
collaborative work. Despite the benefits that teamwork
promises to business organizations determined to improve
productivity, quality, and worker commitment, many appear
to struggle with the implementation of more collaborative
organizational structures and work processes.
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Healthcare Research
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Patterns of Care and Facility Design:
The construction boom is one indication of changes occurring in healthcare. In anticipation of building or, more immediately, to reduce costs, maintain margins, and improve quality, some healthcare organizations are adopting the techniques of lean manufacturing to identify the best patterns of care. As a result of aligning people with efficient processes and logical layouts, these organizations are controlling costs even as they are improving patient outcomes. For these health systems, and the lean consultants advising them, the value of flexible facilities and modular furnishings is becoming increasingly apparent. These organizations have redesigned physical spaces as part of reengineering processes. And they are applying the knowledge gained from lean initiatives to the design of future facilities. |
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