by Jeffrey Hollander, Founder/President of Hollander Design Group, & Viveca Bissonnette, Founder/Principal of Hollander Design Group
How do we move forward when we still don’t have all the answers?
The role of the office feels like it’s changing…but we all seem to be in a holding pattern. As we find out more and more about how COVID-19 is spread and, as we have more data on how we are doing working remotely, we are focused on how and even why we bring people back to the office. While these discussions are ongoing…not many are making any concrete changes to their workspace…for now.
According to research by McKinsey, 80% of workers enjoy working from home with 40% saying they are more productive. Yet all of us are anthropologically wired to be social, and the resulting interaction produces spontaneous idea gardens that foster creativity and spurs innovation. Being together is vital to employee engagement and fostering an organization’s culture.
Still, what do those in charge of the personal and professional welfare of employees need to consider…now, six months from now, and hopefully when an effective vaccine becomes available?
Roles and processes have been refined and adjustments to space have to follow for the overall health and growth of individuals and business alike.
Solutions are like fingerprints…each organization is going to have to evaluate its situation…and the solutions are going to have to be custom tailored to fit their needs.
We need the burden of proof to fall on those wanting to stay with the way “we’ve always done it”. All processes and habits will have to be reexamined and likely re-imagined.
Many of our clients are suffering from decision paralysis.
We don’t know what to do now, so we either do nothing, or the plans for future workspace are predicated on the fact that we will have a cure…but what about the next pandemic?
Change is difficult and often costly, but we have proven to be resilient during these unprecedented times. This resiliency needs to be part of our vocabulary moving forward. If we are compelled to move forward, then what? We will not fully understand what new patterns look like until we actually return to the office and observe them. Therefore, one key component of any decision regarding space planning must be design and product agility.
So…will people return to the office or not? While many organizations would like to return to how things once were, they will get massive pushback from teams that have been working virtually for up to one year. There has been a major upside to working from home for many people. The focused quiet space that has been greatly lacking in many open office environments is now built in through WFH. The open collaborative environment can now be what it was truly meant to be… communal, vibrant and engaging.
We know that the world is not going to snap back to the way it used to be after a year of working virtually.
Building space just like before is guaranteed to be wrong even though it may feel like the politically safe path right now.
The real winners will be the organizations that attempt to face the future and actively adapt to it.
The design community is uniquely equipped to tackle these issues. Designers thrive in an environment where we are challenged. Change is what we do.
We can do this together.
The team at HDG