What does a productive office look like?
One of the most effective ways to get the most productivity from your employees is to make them comfortable in their work space. According to Gensler’s Work Performance Index data, the biggest factor affecting an employee’s ability to focus is the physical environment around them.
Productive offices do not all look the same and creating one really comes down to what works best for your employees. Here are our best tips on getting the most productivity from your office space.
Light and heat
Bright and refreshing environments can lead to better focus in employees. Giving staff control over how warm or bright an office is, gives them control over their environment and allows them to eliminate distractions themselves.
According to Business Insider, control over the AC/heating in an office can produce a 3.7% increase in productivity and up to 10.7% when employees are able to turn light levels up and down.
Keep it tidy, keep it digital
These two can go hand in hand. Clutter may be seen as the friend of the creative mind but it’s often the enemy of concentration. To combat stacks of papers and memos, some companies have introduced paper bans in the office.
Online cloud storage services, capable of supporting all file types, are removing paper from the office and moving it to the smartphones and tablets that dominate our lives as it is. This helps to not only save the trees, but also to save space in the office and de-clutter the mind.
Sound and Colour
In an article by Fortune, lead designer at New York based W&P Design, Justin Fuller, often wears earphones in their open planned HQ in Brooklyn. Wearing the headphones, whether there is music is playing or not, simply translates to “don’t bother me” and focuses his productivity.
Similarly, open plan offices can be a hub of common creativity and idea sharing. They can be the ideal setting for young, promising start up companies or large multinationals attempting to set up shop in a new country.
It’s well known that colours, bright or dark, have an inherent effect on the brain and a person’s perception of their environment. For example, blue is associated with stimulating the mind. Strong tones of the colour in office decor can help employees focus in on the problems at hand and concentrate on finding a solution.
Know your employees
One of the first steps that ought to be taken when undertaking any modifications to a workspace should be factoring in the actual employees’ opinions and ideas. Not every member of staff works the same way. Some simply can’t “drown out” background noises and others will work better in busy and noisy environments.
Ask what changes employees want in an office and put this to the forefront when planning for the future. By allowing employees to contribute their ideas to how the company might grow and giving them a platform for their voices to be heard, they gain more self-confidence and self-esteem. An employee with a good sense of well-being will inevitably be a productive one.
A change of scenery
Sometimes the best thing can be to temporarily relocate part of the workforce to a new setting entirely. The new environment has the potential to be handpicked and catered specifically to your company’s and employees’ needs. This option can range from a single employee at a new desk working on a solo project, to an entire team relocating for a fresh outlook.
A new setting can help encourage new ideas. With an open office plan in a shared coworking office, a new part of town and a new routine, an employee is likely to excel to new levels of creativity and productivity.