How Corona is changing our workplace: ten theses on the office of the future
We will also do our home office in Corona. That changes the office. It becomes a place for social contacts and an oasis of wellbeing for employees. Emails will be banned and meeting rooms obsolete.
Plexiglass walls are also used in the office
The open plan office is an infectious risk zone. No, you do not have to go back to the closed individual offices. But the premises will be adjusted. Office tables have shrunk in recent years. From an average of 1.8 meters to 1.4. That is now the end.
“The individual employee gets more space again,” says the architect Arjun Kaicker, who designed offices for Apple, in the British newspaper “The Guardian”. On the floor, 2-meter markings indicate where each individual’s zone begins. This not only protects against viruses, but also against sexual harassment.
Plexiglass walls are also raised here and there. But not makeshift as we see them at the supermarket checkouts. They are said to contribute to a hip atmosphere. The Swiss furniture manufacturer Vitra has presented a sliding plexiglass wall that can be equipped with green plants and thus brings nature into the office.
Meeting rooms are no longer necessary
In the home office, we learned that virtual meetings are at least as efficient as real ones. Do they work best if everyone takes part in it via camera and screen? if only half is present virtually, you do not know whether you should look into the room or into the tube. Therefore, the following applies: Nobody needs boring meeting rooms anymore. The interior should be torn out and the space used for other purposes.
The office is a mixture of kitchen and living room
You can work at home and take part in meetings. What is the office still needed for? For Barbara Josef, who accompanies 5 to 9 other companies in change processes with her company, it serves two purposes: on the one hand, it is a kind of home for employees, on the other hand, it serves to represent customers and partners. “It is therefore both a cozy kitchen and a stylish living room,” says Josef.
Employees should feel comfortable in it like at the kitchen table of a shared apartment. A good coffee machine is no longer enough. Cooking facilities, ping-pong table and bookshelves are included. For foreigners, the company is at its best in the best location: stylish furniture expresses the spirit of the company and gives you the feeling that you are in a chic living room.
The social aspect is becoming more important
When Microsoft Switzerland completely renovated its offices a few years ago, the employees worked in the home office for three months. The company commissioned a study from ETH: the productivity of individual employees rose by 30 percent. But team productivity dropped after a few weeks. It is therefore important that the team members have analogous contact from time to time.
The office becomes a meeting point for team members. You no longer discuss things in meeting rooms? whose interior have we already torn out? but when cooking, jogging, walking and playing beach volleyball. Of course, this is not efficient. But: «Digressing is desirable, so you get other thoughts, get to know each other differently. Both are positive for the development of projects and team building », says Barbara Josef. The office of the future therefore offers various opportunities for diversion, sports fields, showers and ideally a park.
No emails are answered in the office
The best thing to do when you come to the office is to set up a vacation note in Outlook: “I’m in the office today. E-mails are therefore not answered. » Writing emails is more efficient at home. In the office, you should dedicate yourself entirely to your team members and not be distracted by virtual communication. The inbox can be processed in the home office.
There are no more door latches
Another interior design adjustment: viruses stick to door latches and lift buttons. Therefore they should be replaced. Thanks to motion sensors, sliding doors open automatically – very important for toilets. Pulling out a badge makes fiddling with the key obsolete. Are stairways designed to be more attractive so that they prefer employees to lifts? This way they are spared viruses and do something for their fitness.
Anyone who wants or has to take the lift should be able to operate it with voice control or gestures. “We are thinking about how to operate lifts without contact,” says Janet Pogue McLaurin from architecture firm Gensler to US TV station CNBC.
The surfaces will also change. “Metal, leather, synthetic leather, plastic and everything that is easy to clean is becoming more relevant,” writes the furniture company Vitra in a study of the furnishings in Corona times.
Coworking spaces will boom
In the past two months we have noticed that there is no need to commute to the office every day. However, at home it feels tight at times, sometimes the ceiling even falls on your head. The solution is called coworking space. In such shared offices, you can temporarily rent a job and work in an inspiring atmosphere (and with good coffee). “Companies should finance a coworking space subscription for their employees,” says Barbara Josef. This is how they come into contact with exciting people outside the company, which ultimately benefits the company.
Freelancers are becoming more important
Video telephony, chat communication and cloud services make it possible: You don’t have to be on site to work together. But does that also mean that you do not have to employ all of the employees permanently, but that you can hire them as freelancers depending on the project? from anywhere in the world.
The freelancer model gets a boost. Conversely, this means that having a permanent job is becoming more difficult. If you don’t perform, you may be scrapped.
The office of the future changes the cityscape
If there are more employees in the home office, a company needs less work space. Desk sharing, the sharing of workplaces, is becoming standard. Research shows that an innovative company still needs around 60 jobs for 100 employees.
The trend should continue to accentuate. Managers will quickly see the savings potential. A central location in the city center is still en vogue (see thesis 3). But you can sublet or sell floors.
Stefan Breit, futurologist at the Gottlieb Duttweiler Institute, puts it this way: «It’s like consumption: online shopping leads to the loss of shops, home office leads to the death of offices. The vacant areas can be used for other functions. »
Finding the work-life balance is even harder
If we work at home and go to the office for social contacts, it means that it will be even more difficult to find our work-life balance. The work doesn’t end when we leave the office. On the contrary: there is more fun in the foreground.
Instead, work is concentrated at home. The time can be divided freely. It is therefore of central importance for individuals not only to empty the working memory of the computer every day, but also the brain and to polish at the end of the day. The rapid switch between leisure and work becomes even more of a challenge.
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