Coming to America: Orangebox, Products and Research

 

Orangebox is here! Responding to a call from its U.S. clients, Mino Vernaschi’s Wales based furniture manufacturer has opened a factory in Grand Rapids, MI. It will now be accepting orders here in the U.S. for its furniture products.

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Air Pod by Orangebox. Photography: courtesy of Orangebox

In Grand Rapids, Orangebox found an enthusiastic team of passionate people to work on its products. It plans to begin by producing just a small portion of its European product offerings stateside. Fortunately, given the reception it’s already received, the Orangebox Air Pod is on that short list.

Air Pod creates a private space for meetings. With its interchangeable panels, the Air Pod offers clients an easy way to change finishes and colors over time, while bringing acoustic privacy to the open office environment. The Mini Pod accommodates one person. The standard Air Pod can be built to accommodate up to twelve people using the same components. Designed with a louvered roof, for air circulation and to meet fire code requirements, users can control lighting and air from within while maintaining privacy for heads down work or conferencing.

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Gerard Taylor, Creative Director at Orangebox.

Last week, Creative Director Gerard Taylor and Wellness Director Jim Taylour of Orangebox spoke at ONEder, a Bay Area event designed to highlight the importance of collaboration by bringing together an eclectic mix of products, thought leaders, designers, makers and end users. ONEder was hosted by ONE Workplace in Silicon Valley last week; for more coverage of the ONEder event, see last week’s edition of officeinsight. Messrs. Taylor and Taylour delivered powerful messages about the effects technology and the workplace have on humans.

Our Default Settings and Embracing Change

Mr. Taylor (Gerry) highlighted the shift in how large organizations are seeing design and are applying design principles to the way people work. He noted how quick many people (and companies) are to embrace new technology, only to find years later that they charged down the wrong track.

“We’re only as good as our default settings,” he continued, noting that technology was intended to make work simpler, but it has not.

Mr. Taylor went on to make some fascinating observations, riffing on the “default settings” we have, and pointing out that the original meaning of the word business was: anxiety, distress, officiousness and difficulty.

The environments that we create to use technology have to become more humane. Mr. Taylor sees a “perfect storm” coming between the pace of technology change and new generations seeing the world differently.

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Avi High by Orangebox

He quoted Malcom Gladwell, “We are experiencing a paradigm shift from a hierarchical society, to a network society, and from the individual to the connected and collaborative.”

That the generations see and experience the world differently is not news. There has been much written about this shift in recent years. In Mr. Taylor’s terms, Millennials have different “default settings” than people even younger than them. One of his slides had a surprisingly harsh quote from Will Self:

“For Millennials, the web and the internet have created a permanent now. And because of queered demographics, our living longer and lower birthing population, Boomers squat on top of the pyramid of endeavors and crush the young with our nostalgic tastes.”

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Avi High by Orangebox

Wow. Pretty rough! Mr. Taylor then cited history. There were four key inventions that shaped the workplace in the 1880s: the telephone, the light bulb, the typewriter and the elevator. Now, we live in a world where telephony is more widespread than clean air and water. For the past 125 years, we worked to connect furniture, not people. Now we connect people, not furniture.

So why is change so difficult?

Think of Y2K; Mr. Taylor reminded us of the billions spent on what turned out to be a “non” issue.

Today, “group think” and “siloism” are the key issues faced by companies who are attempting to change. One painful example of companies having difficulty bringing about change was when the Xerox innovation team in 1969 came out with a personal computer, called the Alto. Senior Xerox executives had some pretty amazing (in retrospect) comments:

“It’s beneath men to know how to type.”

And, “The computer will never be as important to society as the copier.” (my favorite).

Mr. Taylor reiterated how powerful our default settings are; they keep us from seeing the future accurately.

Orangebox Insights on Physical and Psychological Workplace Wellbeing

Orangebox Wellbeing Director, Mr Taylour (Jim), sees a myriad of physical and psychological aspects of the workplace. He talked about rapid change in the office environment today – again, not a new topic. But Mr. Taylour’s take was more nuanced than most, and his research encompasses much to ponder.

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Jim Taylor, Wellness Director at Orangebox.

Take the nature of noise, for example. New research into the psychology of sound, how it can enhance the work arena instead of detract, and how it can help us de-stress instead of stress, is a hot topic. Mr. Taylour noted the following observations from his research:

>Background noise increases stress and undermines people’s short-term memory and concentration.

>Speech recognition is the most disturbing of background noise distractions, but all other sources have an effect.

>Extreme quiet tends to sharpen your focus, but may prevent you from thinking in the abstract.

It’s not surprising that this research meshes perfectly with the introduction of the Orangebox Air Pod.

Mr. Taylour cited a TED talk by Julian Treasure, in which he accuses architects of designing with their eyes and not their ears. He then went further, asking, “What about smell? How might we design in terms of smell?”

When companies employ wellbeing as a tenet for their employees, they tend to improve productivity, increase employee satisfaction, and improve retention.

What about humor and fun? If fear blocks working memory, can adding playful touches to the work environment help us? And, let’s not forget mindfulness in the workplace. Here in California (I know, I know!), there are movements to incorporate mindfulness as a daily part of our work schedules. Mindfulness, research indicates, improves focus and eases stress. Mr.Taylour humorously reminded us that the Orangebox Air Pod would be the perfect place for a mindfulness break during the workday.

Then, there’s the importance of making work part of your lifestyle. That’s what younger generations seek; they evaluate places to work based upon things like gym memberships and (of course) atmosphere, seeking places where they can feel free to express themselves. We look forward to hearing more insights from Orangebox’s Gerard Taylor and Jim Taylour!

For more information on Orangebox, please contact Adrian Welch (adrian.welch@orangebox.com), based in San Francisco, or Andy Trickey (andy.trickey@orangebox.com), based in Boston.