WORK SPACE DESIGN

Principles of Work Space design



Principles of Work Space design

Introduction

The offices we create are often technologically advanced and increasingly they are concerned in maintaining the health and wellbeing of the people who work in them. High quality working environments do not, in themselves, produce total quality. Old methods of managing, where systems of tight control are exercised over people having little responsibility, are just as likely to occur in splendid new surroundings as in worn-out installations. Conversely, I have seen many instances of managers expecting their newfound organisational strategies to prosper in physical settings which cannot adequately support the tasks to be performed. Mismatches between an organisation's management style and its working environment occur frequently, but in those organisations dedicated to achieving total quality we can expect to see a remarkable change take place. Here, the process of quality improvement demands that every aspect of an organisation which is capable of making a contribution to quality should make it. As I will demonstrate, the potential contribution that can be made by the working environment is considerable. For this reason I believe it will cease to be a matter of cosmetic concern but, instead, become an integral part of an organisation's drive towards total quality.

It is understandable, of course, that managements are reluctant to face up to the consequences of difficult and disruptive physical change. Experiences in this area of activity are not always rewarding; they can take a lot of time and produce results which, in being short-lived and the cause of much dissension, hardly justify the amount of effort expended. Managers, therefore, seek to keep things as they are for as long as possible; they rely on the natural resilience and adaptability of people to carry on working in spite of being given uncomfortable and sometimes unsuitable working conditions. Usually, the minor changes that are carried out in response to new organisational initiatives are not enough to produce fundamental changes in the office environment; existing constraints remain.

This tendency to relegate the importance of the physical environment to a low level has been tacitly endorsed by most management gurus from the days of the Hawthorn experiments onwards. But, in spite of this, some useful advances have been made in the last 40-50 years. We have learned, sometimes painfully, the importance of carrying out indepth office planning studies, in which the requirements of individuals are subjected to a determined and thorough investigation before carrying out environmental changes. Even if these subsequently prove to be short-lived and fail to remove underlying causes of discontent, at least office workers have been made aware that their problems and difficulties have received some consideration. It is this process of caring for people, taking an interest in what they think about their surroundings and the factors that influence their attitudes to work that can be described as the single most important cause of change in our organisations. It produces, according to W.G. Bennis (a social psychologist examining changing organisations), a new concept of man, ...