For centuries, business leaders have been grappling with the issue of how to maximise the return on their two greatest costs (and opportunities): people and workplace. The workplace is constantly evolving and adapting to improve the productivity and experience of its users, striving to give companies an edge in the battle for talent to help them grow and thrive. To ensure a bright future for your business, you have to ensure that your workspace is maximising the productivity and wellbeing of your people, both now and in the years to come.
The amount of disruptive change in the last few months has created high levels of uncertainty about the immediate future, let alone about 2, 5, or 10 years ahead. However, through examining what are lasting factors, and what are passing trends, you can set a blueprint for the way you work in the future. By using this systematic approach you can create a workspace and workforce that can fulfil and drive lasting results for your business.
A well designed and implemented workspace can be very powerful for a business looking to future proof culture and performance. The key to ensuring that you have the best chance of a positive outcome is to make sure you have a good understanding and communication of “what” your new workspace is going to achieve and “why” this is going to be fantastic for the future of your business.
Focus on People
The only thing that hasn’t undergone a complete overhaul in the workplace over the last 100 years is the central element: people. By ensuring that your workforce is at the centre of the way you think about workspace, they will feel supported and empowered. Thinking about your workspace not in terms of features but in terms of holistic user experiences will make your office far more effective and user-orientated.
Your workspace can play a key role in the attraction and retention of top talent, as well as facilitating collaborative and fulfilling experiences that aren’t possible when working remotely. A user-centred workspace that prioritises wellbeing can have a dramatic positive effect on the happiness and performance of your people.
Offering your people varied and dynamic environments to support them in their roles and considering their comfort can dramatically increase their wellbeing and consequently their capability to perform. At a time when the need for skilled and innovative workforces has never been greater, a cutting-edge workspace will increase their wellbeing, enabling them to achieve their full potential and create amazing results for your business.
Flexibility
Over the last few months, our perspective on work has completely changed. No longer is it a place we all attend, all day, every day. It’s now an activity that we can accomplish in a variety of environments, locations, and even time zones! With this in mind, your office has to be flexible, to meet the needs of your people as seamlessly as possible.
By utilising furniture to create rooms and zones rather than traditional methods of fit-out such as partitions, FluidSpace™ allows for maximum flexibility – new zones and rooms can be established without the need for disruptive and expensive construction works. It can even incorporate ‘hackable’ spaces- areas that the users can re-arrange in seconds to match their needs for a specific task, project, or meeting.
With furniture offering mobile and modular systems, your workspace can continually adapt and evolve to the changing need of your people. This offers you the agility to adapt to your changing requirements as and when they happen, giving your people the environment they need to drive your business forward in the future.
Sustainability
Whilst sustainability used to be viewed as an optional and expensive luxury, it is fast becoming a workspace essential. In the future, the reputation of a company will be linked to its sustainability credentials. As a spatial embodiment of your company, your office has a crucial part to play in this.
Furniture is one of the easiest ways to make your office more sustainable. Your first considerations here should be the “3 Rs”- can you Reduce the amount you need through effective design, Re-use what you already have, or purchase products that are wholly or partly Recycled?
Many manufacturers offer product ranges with recycled and/or sustainable materials. When selecting furniture and materials, opting for classic ‘timeless’ styles, both in finishes and structure, can reduce the need for costly redesigns when passing trends go out of fashion.
Durability and longevity of materials and products are also critical factors. If products use poor quality materials or badly designed, they will not be as popular within the space and will remain unused, inevitably needing to be replaced sooner. Furniture should last at least 7-10 years from new, and even after this time you can sell it to second-hand dealers or recycle it, rather than send it to landfill.
The Workspace of the Future
With many organisations unsure of how their real estate portfolios will look in 12-24 months' time, FluidSpace™ is an ideal way to ensure you have the flexibility and confidence to create exceptional workspaces for your company and your people. FluidSpace™ does exactly what it says – it creates agile, flexible workspaces that can be reconfigured to meet the changing demands of teams and organisations.
The flexibility of FluidSpace™ allows it to adapt and grow with your needs, therefore helping to future proof this significant investment. With economies and industries changing so rapidly, companies need adaptable workspaces that can be repurposed easily and effectively.
Exceptional workspace plays an integral role in both attracting and creating exceptional employees, which in turn create exceptional results - and companies. The workspace is not only a building but a destination that empowers your people, without boundaries or constrictions. Through FluidSpace™, you can create your own workspace that meets the current needs of your business and can adapt seamlessly to an uncertain future.
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