The new workplace and the technology model

The new workplace and the technology model

By STEPHEN W. COX
JPC Incorporated

Our marketing manager recently asked me if JPC was worried about the impacts of telecommuting for a company such as ours, whose primary market is the design of office space.

Schematic study for Detroit prototype of what is now Sidewalk.com, an online information service.
No, I am not a bit worried. I explained that the social, interpersonal nature of people hasn't fundamentally changed in thousands of years. The desire of people to work together, share ideas and socialize within the workplace will never be replaced by e-mail no matter how personalized this media may become.

While there must always be accommodations to the needs and opportunities of higher technologies, the workplace must provide a place where people can gather, share ideas and pool their collective energies.

Opportunities of technology

Recent ongoing advances in people's abilities to share information and network resources are essential to sustaining a business today. The promise of enhanced communication by sharing files, information and databases offers the ability to work easier, smarter and above all, faster.

The speed at which tasks can now be performed is staggering. Even more staggering are the expectations generated by this capacity. Decisions must now be integrated into this raging river of workflow, at a pace often dictated more by the capabilities of our tools than the traditional nine-to-five work model.

The additional promise of telecommuting seems to offer two things: relief from the rat race and instant, productive access to our workflow from any location, at any time.

But the office fulfills many traditional and functional roles. Your workplace welcomes your customers and establishes a presence in the marketplace.

From a marketing perspective, the image of your company is there in the design of your workplace, whether it is casual and low-key or serious and intense. It is a place where you are encouraged to feel good about what you've done and your customers are inspired to feel good about you. It is here that the corporate image and corporate culture is reflected and validated.

From an architectural perspective, however important image is, the design of an office must work for the corporate culture.

Another role fulfilled by the workplace is that of supporting the people and the work that goes on around them. The traditional pattern shows offices along the perimeter windows, with executive offices at the corners, and support personnel workstations located closer to the core.

This expresses functionally and symbolically the hierarchical relationships among the people and the nature of the work being performed. The desire is still there to bring people together, within one space, to achieve common goals and purposes.

Take away the workplace, or provide a workplace with little means for interaction, and what do you have? People sitting alone in their living rooms, dens, cubicles or cars, pounding on keyboards, with very little human contact. Is this type of corporate environment conducive to productivity?

At first your answer might be yes, if it promotes concentration and eliminates downtime. But ask yourself, How long can human beings survive without human contact? Over time this type of corporate culture will begin to suffer because, aside from short bits of privacy, people have an innate need to share creative energies with one another.

The well designed workplace reinforces a company's image by providing a showcase. But it also enhances productivity by bringing people together for good reasons: sharing knowledge and creative energies, providing fellowship, and promoting socialization.

The technology model

The explosion of start-up technology companies has bred the perception that office design must radically change to accommodate a host of new needs and goals. This is both true and false.

The office of today must support the tools of technology: better telecommunication, computers, networks, desktop publishing and design. The designer must understand the physical constraints and infrastructure demands implied by all of these new tools.

In addition to supporting the tools, the design of your workplace must support the people and the pace of work today. High-technology companies frequently work long hours. The pace of their marketplace is breathtakingly fast. New products and services are brought to market at an astonishing rate, often within a winner-take-all economy with a continuous cycle of forming and re-forming project teams.

Work environments for these companies must accommodate the needs of flexible teams. We often seek, in our design for technology companies, to open-up the process and promote a high degree of interaction within project team areas. Corridors become places for impromptu meetings with the addition of white boards and small areas to eddy-out of the circulation path. A scattering of small one-on-one rooms provides places for quick conferences, project rooms or a quiet focused retreat.

The design of these office environments must recognize the hours and speed at which people must work. Employees often wind and unwind in the same environment and so require space in which to relax before tackling the next wave of deadlines.

Lounges, lunch and break rooms, outdoor and common areas become vitally important to escape and recharge. The design of these places meets a different set of criteria from the workplace, including far-away views for resting the eye, varied lighting and colors and the opportunity for left vs. right brain stimulation.

As traditionally designed workplaces need to interface with their high-technology brethren, they find themselves needing to borrow bits and pieces of the technology-oriented workplace for their own use.

They frequently seek to express, more directly, the work process and support flexible teams.

Many traditional clients are choosing to relocate enclosed offices toward the building core, giving the windows and natural lighting to everybody. They recognize that the design of their workplace and the amenities provided can be a powerful tool to recruit and retain the quality of people necessary to stay ahead in today's marketplace.

Design for technology is nothing more than design for people -- people with different tools, working at different speeds, within constantly shifting organizational structures -- but still people with social, personal and human needs. The traditional pattern has gotten a soft kick in its slightly more casual pants.

Stephen Cox is an architect and director of design at JPC Inc.

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