A generational shift and advances in technology are changing the work environment. Corporate America seeks to draw young workers who, rather than swinging hammers, wield mobile devices to generate ideas and produce results. Today’s college graduates have experienced an environment with more amenities than ever before, and with them comes new expectations about the workplace: “I'm going to work the way I want. I'm going to come up with an idea with my buddies at Starbucks and revolutionize the things." This is the new and pervasive culture that is redefining corporate architecture.
Much has been written about the Millennial generation. Their emergence into the working world comes with a sense of openness for all. Thus, the challenge is more than designing building and spaces to attract, inspire and retain one micro-generation. Today’s workplace requires designers and employers to look holistically at the organization’s culture, its criteria for success, and its place in the world. Shaping an effective workplace is about more than rethinking its architecture. Designers must push beyond the idea of ‘this is the way we do it here’ and drill down to the intentions and vision for that specific business.
Out-of-the-Cubicle
Technology has altered the work process, and in many ways its product, but the rules of workplace engagement have changed too. What is today’s expectation of how we should work? Not long ago, an employee was given a task and went to their office or cubicle to accomplish it. The employee with their ‘nose to the grindstone’ was the ideal. Today’s model says, "Yes, an employee sits in that spot, but also makes impactful contact with others." At McKinney, an advertising firm in Durham, creative directors have the smallest offices and aren’t expected to be in their office until after 5 o'clock; they're expected to be out talking to their teams.
The push for mobility and flexibility is not tied to any one generation or corporate level. Now, even CEOs are taking their laptops and smartphones to Starbucks in search of a different type of space. People crave the freedom to move around, within, and beyond a designated space. Many clients still want private offices, but they’re also looking for areas to collaborate and varied meeting spaces. Some companies are reducing office size because they want employees out in the organization or the community, not behind a desk.
With more than just a nod to office redesign, companies are relocating from the suburban areas to more central locations near public transportation and amenities. These metro locations place them closer to the people they want to hire and retain—an exciting, urban minded, and creative new workforce. But this trend is about more than just convenience: a 2015 survey of Millennials found 77% choose a workplace based partly on whether the company has “a sense of purpose,” and revitalizing neglected urban centers is considered both green and socially responsible. The trend toward urbanization is an environmental plus, because city dwellers drive less, live in spaces that use less energy, and require fewer resources than their suburban counterparts.
Courtesy Robert Benson Photography.
Creativity’s Stock is Up
Creativity in the workplace is no longer an option. On the heels of successful enterprises such as Apple and Google, fostering creativity expands an organization’s potential. More traditional corporate cultures—law firms, sales organizations, and service companies—have made significant advancements in valuing creativity. But how is creativity added to a culture that never had it before? Simply adding a new collaboration or creative space and assuming staff, who come from a traditional work world, will change their behavior is a fallacy and can cause skepticism.
Reflecting and facilitating creativity in the workplace means allowing for flexibility and different working styles, and both aid in accommodating all levels of diversity. Space for moving around, getting out of an individual workspace and talking as a group, and collaborating with multiple team members requires different types of spaces and furnishing. The Dilbert-type cubicle is the antithesis of creativity. Take away the cubicle and people are suddenly in the same room together. Then, it's not just fulfilling a task— the individual is in a place where the metrics are group oriented. This is where creativity kicks in, and that's how the business world is transforming. Most architectural and design firms utilize open studios for exactly this reason.
Open, flexible space is advantageous for organizations, which can function like a workplace laboratory, modifying and adapting to changing needs. For example, rather than just adding conference rooms, multifunction spaces simply do more: roof terraces, café, breakout, and meditation areas allow equally for meetings, conferencing, and individual focus. GlaxoSmithKline recently put ‘phone rooms’ into their offices, so employees have a private place to use their cellphones. And they aren’t alone as companies as diverse as Slate Magazine as well as laboratories and construction companies make way for a variety of diverse, flexible spaces.
Courtesy Duda|Paine Architects.
Architecture and HR
Today, mobility and flexibility free staff to work where, when, and how they want, but that freedom has eroded our sense of where work stops. ‘Office hours’ can mean 24/7 with the technology created in just one generation. Employees must become stewards of their own work/life balance. In response, companies are thinking more holistically and asking architecture to project this new attitude.
Shaping the right office environment is an investment and a company’s best recruiting tool. At Cox Headquarters, a prospective recruit is typically convinced after a tour of the amenity rich campus, which in addition to a gym and café options, includes landscaped gardens. Cox’s goal is to do more than recruit great employees, it's retention.
The new generation employee also cares more about health and is infinitely more informed on the topic than previous generations. With their professional expectations and spatial needs shaped by experiences in education, they see the balance between good health and good work as essential. Connecting a work environment more directly to the outdoors, as Cox has done, is one approach.
Making Work Visible
An e-blast might not be the best way to showcase an organization’s work. More and more organizations are looking to gallery spaces and ‘innovation halls’ to showcase what they do to the public, future recruits, and staff. The idea of being able to see what people in a company are working on opens everyone to being informed and inspired. At the award-winning John Deere Moline headquarters, Eero Saarinen and Kevin Roche made a conscious decision for staff members to enter the headquarters building through a two-story museum, which includes a 3-dimensional mural of the company’s history, as well as vintage and new tractors, bulldozers, and other equipment. Thus, whether an employee balances the books, works in HR, or designs machinery, they experience firsthand what John Deere is all about.
Stop Blaming Millennials!
The new office environment—diverse, flexible, highly accommodating and highly functional—transcends generation. Its advanced technology, mobile-readiness, openness and variety of spaces speak to how all of us, not just today’s graduates, want to work and be successful today.
Courtesy Robert Benson Photography.
Related Stories
| Feb 14, 2013
Boxman Studios launches shipping container buildings division
Boxman Studios has launched a new division aimed at sustainable solutions for the Built Environment. The Boxman Studios Buildings Division will focus on the adaptive use of decommissioned shipping containers as architectural elements and even complete buildings.
| Feb 14, 2013
Guardian DiamondGuard installed in the Empire State Building
Guardian Industries DiamondGuard glass was recently installed on the 102nd story of the Empire State Building in New York City as part of an extensive renovation to update this venerable landmark.
| Feb 12, 2013
OMA's 'perimeter core' design wins competition for Essence Financial Building in Shenzhen
OMA partners David Gianotten and Rem Koolhaas rethink traditional office tower design with a plan that shifts the building's core to the edge for large, unobstructed plans.
| Feb 8, 2013
5 factors to consider when designing a shade system
Designing a shade system is more complex than picking out basic white venetian blinds. Here are five elements to consider when designing an interior shade system.
| Feb 6, 2013
RSMeans cost comparisons: office buildings and medical offices
RSMeans' February 2013 Cost Comparison Report breaks down the average construction costs per square foot for four types of office buildings across 25 metro markets.
| Feb 1, 2013
Delinquency rate for U.S. commercial real estate loans hits 11-month low
The delinquency rate for U.S. commercial real estate loans in CMBS fell 14 basis points in January to 9.57%. This is the lowest level in 11 months, according to Trepp, LLC's latest U.S. CMBS Delinquency Report.
| Jan 31, 2013
The Opus Group completes construction of corporate HQ for Church & Dwight Co.
The Opus Group announced today the completion of construction on a new 250,000-square-foot corporate headquarter campus for Church & Dwight Co., Inc., in Ewing Township, near Princeton, N.J.
| Jan 31, 2013
More cities requiring large buildings to use EPA’s energy management and reporting
In 2012, Philadelphia joined several other U.S. cities in passing a requirement that large buildings use Portfolio Manager, the Environmental Protection Agency’s energy management tool, to measure and report energy performance.
| Jan 29, 2013
Astellas' New Headquarters for the Americas Earns LEED Gold Certification
The new headquarters for Astellas in the Americas in Northbrook, Ill., has been awarded LEED Gold certification by the USGBC.