Before buying the furniture your office needs, it’s important to get an idea of how each desk or chair will be arranged. An office layout determines this, including the amount of spacing between workstations and the number of cubicles and rooms.
A good office layout makes all the difference in improving the productivity and well-being of the staff. This becomes more important amid recent calls to return to the office, something that many Australians aren’t looking forward to. Nevertheless, the least businesses can do is to build an office worth returning to.
The Future Workplace
The brick-and-mortar office is unlikely to disappear anytime soon, given the ongoing so-called “return-to-office tug-of-war” between employers and employees. But whether it’s back to on-site work or settling for a hybrid setup, experts agree that the future workplace should give office employees a reason to look forward to workdays.
According to Iva Durakovic, an interior architect researcher at the University of New South Wales, flexibility is the name of the game. This doesn’t only refer to work arrangements but also – and more importantly – the office’s ability to address current challenges like growing cultural diversity and adoption of new technologies.
With that, Durakovic outlined four elements that the office space of tomorrow should have.
- Fit for purpose: Enable office elements to be reconfigured for new work processes, enhancing collaboration and productivity.
- Connection to place: Promote a culture of belonging and camaraderie among the staff, regardless of rank or role in the workplace.
- Building trust: Foster trust among employees through face-to-face encounters, helping instil a sense of self-worth and boost productivity.
- Clear choices: Adapt to the post-pandemic realities, namely by allowing workers to choose between office and remote work based on circumstance.
Embracing this design philosophy entails trusting people more, but it also involves creating a conducive office environment with all the necessary office equipment. Melbourne office furniture, like other design elements, has a role to play, even if its purpose is limited to comfort.
Choose Your Layout
Every office layout begins with an empty floor space, be it a first-time fit-out or a revamp. The space is your canvas, meaning you can design the layout any way your work requires. Below are several types to choose from.
Open-Plan Layout
This layout foregoes dividers and partition walls altogether, enabling workers in the same team to see or talk with each other without having to get up. The lack of walls also saves on costs, lets more natural light into the interior, and makes future redesigns easier.
However, this isn’t an ideal choice for offices whose work involves some degree of privacy. For example, banks and law offices may need enclosures where they can discuss sensitive details with their clients. Some open-plan offices also opt to have private spaces for managers whose work requires their undivided attention.
Cubicle Layout
Cubicles are synonymous with the modern office design, offering a balance of privacy and collaboration. They come in a wide range of types, from standard private cubicles to low-walled ones designed to accommodate several workstations. The latter can be a cost-effective way to add more workstations.
A cubicle layout offers some level of collaboration, but it isn’t as much as an open-plan one. Also, while walled cubicles can be reconfigured to change the number of private workstations, their private counterparts lack such versatility.
Cellular Layout
In this layout, every team in the workplace gets their own room featuring an open-plan design. It encourages interaction and closer collaboration among members and fosters a sense of community. Brainstorming sessions and other impromptu team meetings can also be held in the team’s room instead of having to book the meeting room.
That said, the layout involves partition walls or glass panes, adding to the required amount of space. It may not work for offices with small floor space or large teams, especially also considering the cost of creating the enclosures.
Take this opportunity to ask the staff about visual distractions and other issues when working, such as noise or lack of space. Enough calls for more spacious individual workstations should be able to convince you to refresh the layout.
It goes without saying that all layouts will have chairs and desks, but the type matters. Workstations are perfect for open-plan office layouts, whereas an individual office may house either an executive desk or a couple of task desks depending on who’ll use it and what purpose it’ll serve.
Think Ergonomics
We’re under no illusion that sitting for most of one’s waking hours is good for their health. Yet, desk jobs require just that (though with breaks in between). In this case, the next best thing should be to optimise the workplace to be as ergonomic as possible.
Promoting workplace ergonomics involves reducing the risk of work-related injury. In this case, prolonged sitting is a good way to suffer back pain. Ergonomic office furniture helps lower such risks by being made to promote proper sitting posture. For example, ergonomic chairs follow the spine’s natural curves to reduce the burden of long hours of sitting.
However, furniture features are only one part of the equation; proper positioning is also a factor. According to Comcare, an ergonomic workstation should achieve the following:
- The top of the monitor should be at eye level
- The user’s chin should run parallel to the floor
- The monitor should be at least an arm’s length away from the user
- The document holder should be placed between the monitor and the keyboard
- Forearms should be slightly angled downward toward the keyboard
- The chair’s backrest should provide proper lumbar or lower back support
- The mouse should be easy to reach from the user’s forearm position
- The adjustable chair’s height should allow the thighs to angle slightly downward
Proper sitting posture doesn’t remove the need to avoid prolonged sitting. Fortunately, a viable workaround is to invest in ergonomic office desks (also called sit-stand desks) that allow users to shift between sitting and standing. These desks can serve as mainstays for your workstations, switching between either posture every 30 minutes.
Conclusion
Getting people back to the office will be an uphill battle for managers and executives. If they need them to, anyway, it pays to take the opportunity to study their existing office layout and determine what needs to be changed for the better.