The silent messages sent by design decisions made are something that environmental psychologists talk about a lot. We review, often at length, topics such as cultural associations to particular hues that find their way onto the walls of an office suite and the implications of choosing an upholstery fabric with relatively more curvilinear or rectilinear lines in it, for example.
Considering unspoken messages seems silly to some.
The people who dismiss the silent communications we have with spaces and objects need to read Cade Metz’s February 19, 2018, New York Times article, “Why A.I. Researchers at Google Got Desks Next to the Boss.” Metz reviews messages floor plans can send. As he reports:
“If you want to understand the priorities of a technology company, first look at the seating chart. At Google’s Silicon Valley headquarters, the chief executive, Sundar Pichai, now shares a floor with Google Brain, a research lab dedicated to artificial intelligence. When Facebook created its own artificial intelligence lab at its offices about seven miles away, it temporarily gave A.I. researchers desks next to the fish bowl of a conference room where its chief executive and founder, Mark Zuckerberg, holds his meetings. ‘I can high-five Mark and Sheryl from my desk, and the A.I. team was right next to us,’ said Facebook’s chief technology officer, Mike Schroepfer, referring to Mr. Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg, the chief operating officer…A growing number of tech companies are pushing research labs and other far-reaching engineering efforts closer to the boss. The point is unmistakable: What they are doing matters to the chief executive. It may even be the future of the company.”
The form of workplaces change over time to send messages that have become more important to management/shareholders/other similar groups – or to stop sending ones that have dropped from favor. Metz reports that just a year ago, the Google Brain team was not working near the boss, they were in a small building across Google’s campus from their current location.
Workplace features of various types, from seats near the boss’s team spaces packed with toys and technology, send nonverbal messages. Often perks that consume relatively more of some limited resource, financial, spatial, or otherwise, have the most value. One of the most treasured, in part because it communicates respect for employees, is control over aspects of their physical environment. That control might “take form” as the ability to rework a space spontaneously, without getting approval from facility managers or division vice-presidents, or the opportunity to determine the refreshment options near a particular conference room, for example.
Designers need to know what things and places communicate to any group they’re working with, and the only way to get the insights needed to reliably translate physical messages into design options is to talk to employees, and really listen to what they have to say. Metz indicates that in Silicon Valley location near the boss is a desirable thing, and that it indicates some sort of value. It is not inconceivable, however, that some high tech executives may choose to sit near groups who are not perceived to be doing well, because the leader wants to improve their performance.
Overtly questioning space users about messages sent can be challenging, but during any conversation people make, spontaneously, comments that relate to what things “mean.” Without the wisdom that comes from actively listening for information about what things in an office “are saying,” a designer can’t be certain what message a seat near the boss, or anything else, actually sends.
Our physical environments continuously transmit silent messages. Smart people listen to them.
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.