City at ransom – and we desperately need superhero workplaces to save us!
Rail and city infrastructure problems show that ‘presenteeism’ doesn’t mean productivity. Therefore employers must open their eyes and workplaces need to adapt. Here’s why and how…
Lately, with failing public transport, January blues and awful weather to contend with, the idea of home or third place working is very tempting. Enlightened employers realise the benefits of keeping staff healthy, happy, motivated and productive. Staff who have the autonomy to work remotely or at least flexibly can be a huge bonus to the bottom line.
As we approach the start of another uncertain year; the days are short, the morning commute as hellish as ever and traffic gridlocked. Wouldn’t it be ideal if more employers recognised this and offered a solution involving flexible hours, remote collaboration or even home-working? And not just at specific periods, but the whole year round?
More and more companies are switching on to the benefits this can bring in terms of their employees’ well-being and productivity. There are many ways firms can ease the old school 9-5 workday grind. They can allow colleagues to occasionally work from home or a third place, provide tools that enable them work remotely, support agile working agenda. This can be done in parallel with making provision for a hi-tech and collaborative workplace where colleagues from can often get together to connect, get work done and be part of an effective team.
Agile or activity based working is the ability to work at any place, at any time and it can be extremely empowering. Employers of course have a big role to play in enabling this – through good IT connectivity and by creating a culture in which it’s seen as acceptable, even encouraged, for staff to work from a tertiary location such as their own homes. Why not make it easy for staff and the company to regain control of inefficient and uncomfortable travel time? Especially when at no fault of your own, the train staff decides to halt the transport system, taking the productivity of several million people at ransom.
Is it really that sensible for bosses to pressure workers to struggle into the office even on days when they are feeling unwell, or if they face childcare issues or transport disruption? ‘Presenteeism’ is a big issue in the British workplace, but studies show it doesn’t aid productivity. It’s best to enable your workforce to be productive anywhere, and the results will speak for themselves.
Employers also need to ask themselves if they are making the most of technology to improve collaboration, employee training and development? A technology strategy has the potential to deliver numerous benefits, ranging from increased productivity to improved staff recruitment and retention. Employers should move beyond traditional office infrastructures, based on the assumption that most people work primarily at a single, fixed location, such as a dedicated workstation.
Our client experience at Morgan Lovell suggests most small, medium and large organisations have a variety of work styles, with varying mobility levels and technology preferences. Executives may spend the majority of time collaborating away from the office, using tablets and smart phones, whereas technical staff may spend a lot of time at their desks making use of high-spec desktop PCs. Therefore, a one-size-fits-all approach for space and technology provision may not be the most appropriate solution, especially in a large enterprise.
To be honest, virtuality will never fully replace actuality. Human beings aren’t there yet. One-to-one human contact is always preferable. But in instances when staff have to be mobile in order to do their job, what additional provisions are in place to facilitate staff collaboration, resolve conflicts or provide training and development? Are employers making the most of tools such as video conferencing, on demand services etc? And can staff access essential online tools such as the intranet, CRM platforms or social media in order to feel properly connected if working from home or remotely?
And finally it’s important to make sure that employees who do work away from the office don’t feel they are or have to be ‘always on’. Working from home saves time in terms of cutting out the commute, but shouldn’t mean people are chained to their ‘desk’ long after office-based colleagues have gone home, just to prove their productivity. The whole point of agile or remote working is to ‘free’ employees to be productive wherever they are, be it the workplace, a coffee shop or collaborative space such as a lab or lecture theatre, or at home.
Creating collaborative spaces where colleagues or counterparts in other organisations can come together is also a big part of how modern organisations should be thinking about how they allow their workforce to hit peak productivity.
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One of the latest major fit outs we have been involved with was delivering a first-class collaborative space for the Alan Turing Institute within the British Library. It’s a mix of communal ‘gathering’ spaces where researchers can mingle, work and relax. Provisions have been made for lecture spaces to share information and smaller work ‘pods’ for those who need privacy. Nearly all the surfaces – the walls, glass partitions etc – are made available for people to jot down notes or messages, work out formulae and share ideas. The whole place is conducive to creativity and problem solving. For many people these days, being shackled to a desk hinders rather than enhances productivity. Isn’t it about time their employers set them free?
THE NEW WORKPLACE ‘TRIBES’
The workforce of the future could well consist of five “tribes” – home producers, remote creatives, collaborative thinkers, agile employees or cottage industrialists. Any employers who are sceptical about giving their workforce more of a free reign should consider that some of the most productive people throughout history didn’t exactly do their best work at a desk. From Leonardo da Vinci and Thomas Edison to the founders of Google, working from home, collaborating with colleagues, or even setting out your stall in a workshop, home studio or garage has all lead to great things. Just ask JK Rowling, who wrote the first Harry Potter story in an Edinburgh coffee shop, or Archimedes, who did his best work in the bath! Even Santa Claus works from home 11 months of the year...
THINKING OUTSIDE THE BOX
Throughout history many great minds have thrived after while unshackled from the 9-to-5 desk job:
Thomas Edison The legendary inventor of the phonograph, the motion picture camera and the electric light bulb created the first ever industrial research lab after getting fired from his night job.
Leonardo da Vinci The archetypal Renaissance man was a polymath for hire, living mainly between Florence or Milan. Rightly celebrated as a genius for the ages, he was so far ahead of his time.
JK Rowling Would Harry Potter have been born had a penniless Rowling not sought refuge and warmth in an Edinburgh coffee house? Necessity truly was the mother of invention in this case.
Steve Jobs & Steve Wozniak The minds behind Apple had a stormy relationship at the best of times; nowhere did more sparks fly than in the Californian garage where they built their first computers.
Crick, Watson, Wilkins & Franklin One of science’s greatest ever collaborations, the foursome co-discovered the double-helix structure of DNA in work that forms the basis of modern biotechnology.
Charles Dickens Haunted by childhood poverty, Dickens made sure to secure income as an author by serialising his work. He toured and lectured widely, writing industriously right up until his death.
Archimedes The Ancient Greek thinker did his best work in the bath; his “eureka!” theory of how to measure volume by displacement caused him to run naked into the street to spread the word.
Jeff Bezos Could the Amazon founder have had any notion that his home shopping business run from his garage in Bellevue, Washington, would go on to change the face of retailing forever?
Larry Page and Sergey Brin Hard to imagine what the Stanford grad students hoped for as they set up shop in Susan Wojcicki’s garage in 1998; it’s probably fair to say Google exceeded those hopes.
Roy and Walt Disney In 1923, Walt and brother Roy moved in with their uncle Robert and set up a studio in his one-car garage. From that acorn grew the world’s highest grossing media company.
Colin Chapman In 1948 the maverick designer and engineer built his first car in stables behind the Railway Hotel in Hornsey, North London, and so gave rise to the iconic Lotus motoring brand.
Alexander Graham Bell A major beneficiary of collaborative working – with the likes of Elisha Gray and Thomas Edison among others – he went down in history as the inventor of the telephone.
William S Harley & Arthur Davidson Harley designed an engine-powered bicycle in 1901, and with childhood friend Davidson founded their legendary motorcycle business in a small shed in Milwaukee.
Bill Hewlett & Dave Packard The pair founded HP – now one of the world’s largest companies – in 1939 in Packard’s garage in Palo Alto, California, widely regarded as the epicentre of Silicon Valley.
Alan Turing In the Second World War, Turing was tasked with cracking the Nazis’ Enigma code. Though not an easy collaboration, his team built the world’s first supercomputer to achieve it.
... Father Christmas Santa Claus is perhaps the world’s best-known cottage industrialist, working from home at least 11 months out of every 12 to prepare for his epic round-the-world gifting spree.
About us: Located in London and the Thames Valley, Morgan Lovell is the UK’s leading office interior design, fit out and refurbishment specialist. With its own teams of designers, surveyors and project managers, the company can design, manage and deliver entire projects, with the benefit of just one point of contact.
Morgan Lovell is part of Morgan Sindall Group plc, a leading UK construction and regeneration group with revenue of over £2.4 billion and which operates through five divisions of construction and infrastructure, fit out, affordable housing, urban regeneration and investments.