Designers, because of the knowledge they have and can acquire about human experience and performance in workplace environments, can and should actively lead the development of these spaces.
Active design leadership regularly entails explaining to clients why workplaces they desire are not the ones where they should work – because of mismatches between the form of a place and the tasks to be accomplished there, the organizational and national culture of the people that will use it, etc. These difficult conversations are tough to initiate, and talks with clients are generally more acquiescent than frank. It’s challenging to convince a CEO who has seen the Googleplex on television or in a movie that maybe something else is a better investment for his/her organization.
Designers have the ability to develop workplace options that clients and users can’t even imagine; introducing those options is a crucial component of active leadership. Because designers focus their careers on thinking about environmental design and are also familiar with materials, etc., they have a better understanding of design possibilities; most clients/users have centered their lives on other concerns.
The workplace options clients and users are familiar with are those that they’re working in, have worked in in the past, have seen in movies/TV/other entertainment media, have found photographs and write-ups of in the popular or professional press, or visited. Fleeting glimpses on a television set, etc., can easily mislead viewers about in-space experiences. Brief visits are often dazzling and glamorous, and frequently create an emotional fog that obscures how well a space really meets clients’/users’ needs.
A frank discussion of spaces seen, etc., and capabilities required is a key component of active design leadership. It’s also important to remember that large segments of the population have difficulty imagining themselves in a space, even if they’re viewing a photo of it, or understanding what it would be like to be in a place that they’ve only viewed a floor plan of. Virtual reality and 3D modeling technologies are doing a lot to bridge this gap in spatial understanding.
One of the most significant mistakes that workplace designers can make is to try to create environments that are “fun.” Research in the peer-reviewed press consistently shows that employees don’t find amusing spaces that even their own executives endorse. Employees see “fun” spaces as creating circumstances that intrude on their personal time. These spaces indicate to employees that employers think they know more about employees than they actually do.
Compelling arguments to support design options presented are rooted in applicable studies from the peer-reviewed press. “Peer-reviewed” means study research methodologies, statistical tests, conclusions drawn, etc., are evaluated and OK’ed by research professional before findings are made public – and those whose methodologies, tests, etc., don’t stand up to scrutiny are never published. If articles in a journal are peer-reviewed, it mentions this on its website. The sorts of studies I discuss with readers have been accepted for publication in peer-reviewed journals or are presented at one of the limited number of conferences where submissions are rigorously peer-reviewed and known to be of high quality.
Active design leadership requires project-specific use-related information, knowledge of design options, an understanding of applicable peer-reviewed research – and the backbone to utilize all three.
Sally Augustin, PhD, a cognitive scientist, is the editor of Research Design Connections (www.researchdesignconnections.com), a monthly subscription newsletter and free daily blog, where recent and classic research in the social, design, and physical sciences that can inform designers’ work are presented in straightforward language. Readers learn about the latest research findings immediately, before they’re available elsewhere. Sally, who is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association, is also the author of Place Advantage: Applied Psychology for Interior Architecture (Wiley, 2009) and, with Cindy Coleman, The Designer’s Guide to Doing Research: Applying Knowledge to Inform Design (Wiley, 2012). She is a principal at Design With Science (www.designwithscience.com) and can be reached at sallyaugustin@designwithscience.com.