The high performance workplace

Published on Mon 14 Nov 2011

So, does the workplace have any impact on productivity and business performance? Well duh. So why are we still trying to convince manager.

One of the great things that has developed about LinkedIn (as well as its main function of keeping people in touch) is its ability to gain an insight into the work and attitudes of other professionals. It certainly adds a new dimension and some vim to the perennial debates that characterise the UK’s facilities management sector.

One issue that crops up on a regular basis, and has done for the 20 or so years I’ve worked in the sector is the one about proving the link between productivity and workplace design and management, especially to senior managers and executives. The first part of this debate should be over by now, given the sheer volume of proof that now exists both in academic research and the less lofty but perhaps more convincing realms of personal experience. It’s because of this that we should acknowledge that at some level everybody knows for a fact that there is a link between our surroundings and our wellbeing and happiness, otherwise not only would we all still be contentedly living in caves and the only thing making employers provide decent workplaces for employees would be the big stick of legislation.

What we find in practice is that the vast majority of people work in at the very least decent if not exceptional workplaces and are provided by their employers with a fair or good degree of comfort, natural light, fresh air and control over how they work along with all those other enlightened features of the contemporary office we take for granted. 

However, if this is true why is there still a constant need to convince ourselves and senior managers? Why is the feature on office design and productivity a staple element in both the media and on forums such as those hosted on LinkedIn. If we assume that the main argument has already been proved beyond reasonable doubt, the only answer can be that there is another, more interesting point lurking behind it all, namely some sort of perception that facilities design and management is not necessarily something that should occupy too much management time.

This flies in the face of all the evidence. Our quest to determine the nature of the link between the office and performance dates back to the 1920s with the famous Hawthorn experiments. More research by Frederick Hertzberg in 1966, appeared to show that the workplace was a hygiene factor, meaning that a poor workplace was a demotivator but a good workplace was not necessarily an important motivator (something worthy of another feature). Since that time however, a great deal of research has been carried out which paints a rather more sophisticated picture of the complex relationship we have with our surroundings. These range from the academic, such as the work of Adrian Leaman and Bill Bordass at the end of the 1990s, through to the general such as Management Today’s now sadly defunct Workplace Satisfaction Survey.
 
More recently we have seen the general point again made in a report from CABE and the BCO called ‘The impact of office design on business performance’. The German Fraunhofer Institute recently published The Office Performance user study, conducted as part of the OFFICE 21 research project, to investigate causal relationships and determine the values of various influencing factors and thereby establish a strategy for improving performance within an office context. And of course there is the excellent ongoing work of the Leesman Index.

The case is, frankly, incontrovertible.  So too is the business case for going beyond what is demanded by legislation and providing a solution based on what is best for the people who work for the organisation. Small investments in design, equipment, management and working culture can produce disproportionately significant effects on productivity, wellbeing and staff recruitment and retention. Even in our own sometimes neglected specialism of office interior design the amount of money that differentiates a decision between two possible options can be very significant indeed. To take just one element, a fairly simple ROI model shows that the payback period for an investment in ergonomic seating and training has a payback term measured in weeks rather than months. For people such as fee earners in law firms, the payback term is likely to be measured in days or even hours.

So we are left with the problem of perception and it is this that we should be addressing, not finding more evidence for something that is pretty clear cut. So how do we deal with this? Well, telling people is one thing. Showing them is entirely another. The media does a good job in sharing experiences within this sector, but there is always scope for more opportunities to learn from what other people have done. This is particularly powerful when you can see what is happening with organisations that have similar challenges to your own, whether because they are in the same sector, have similar property or face the same issues involved in coming up with an office design that does all the good things we would like it to.

There is also a wider problem, as there often is, in the way that commercial enterprises sell the idea of productivity. Many habitually try to argue direct causal links between whatever product or service they offer and the productivity of individuals. We all know why they do it, but all too often the claims fail to take account of the complex interplay of all the factors that make people happy and productive at work.

There is no question that certain products can contribute to the wellbeing of employees, but their beneficial effects can be eradicated by any number of the other factors that shape the complex interplay of people, their jobs, their colleagues and their environment. External factors such as illness or family problems are rarely mentioned in this context, but can override everything else as can an unpleasant boss or colleague. Any particular product can only influence productivity one way or another if all other factors are equal, which they never are. Many commercial firms would do well to remember this before they make claims that their products will increase productivity by 10 per cent or whatever. Buyers quickly become weary, suspicious and cynical.

That is why the best research usually has a list of complex variables that must each be addressed to  achieve the desired increases in personal wellbeing and productivity. It’s not easy but it pays off. Equally important is not only what product is specified to deal with a specific aspect of productivity, but how it is applied, perceived and managed. And if we can get these messages out, in all their complexity and sophistication then we may finally get somewhere in winning an argument that in truth was won years ago.

Ann Clarke is Design Director of Claremont Group Interiors www.claremontgi.com.