Enriched Environments Encourage Creativity
Creating an enriched environment is all about invigorating the physical space. Space planning for an open plan environment is often overlooked as an opportunity to inspire, engage and boost employee performance. Within the constant pulse of competing for the same talent, finding ways to differentiate your business is essential. Creatively leveraging and communicating authentic culture, vision and amenities can elevate stark, impersonal open environments into innovative hives of collaboration and productivity.
Research has shown that people thrive in environments that are “enriched” with color, plants, art, and personal effects. Let’s take that a bit further and incorporate brand messaging into the equation. Creating a space enriched for both brand emersion and empowerment builds an inclusive culture. Involvement in the decision-making process around how the workspace is designed gives collaborative culture a strong foundation.
Enriched Environments Improve Productivity
Allowing staff to contribute to how their space looks and feels has been shown to improve productivity by almost three times more than sparse environments where all involvement has been eliminated. Which is why office design is trending toward polls among staff for any significant changes and updates to the office layout and design.
You spend roughly a third of your day in this space, making it comfortable and productive is significant to both employee and employer.
Enriched environments have been shown to improve productivity by 17%. Environments that people have been empowered to choose, change or design impacts productivity by almost a third over outsourced static environments.
The design of the workplace is important to 84% of office workers. Most open plan office designs cater to those in the creative industry where collaboration is a key player, yet only 23% feel that creativity is supported in the design. Bringing people together to create an enriched environment for socializing is highly successful for culture emersion and brand identity.
Meaningful employee socialization has these important characteristics:
- Activity & agility
- Encouraging a change of pace & environment throughout the day
- Engagement of the senses
- Getting people outside of their normal workspace for collaboration
- Engaging in wellness activities
- Bringing in sound, music & productive distractions
- Providing entertainment & healthy snacks/food
Most likely your office design just needs a few tweaks to provide enrichment, but do a small poll among your team to see what they feel is missing. Start in your reception area and use random compliments as a guidepost. Impressions matter, representing your talent and your brand with a solid design strategy can more deeply engage your team. It can also give your clients a strong message and a broader sense of the forward-thinking momentum and stability of your business.
Office furnishings have come a long way with color and design. They can accommodate any style you can imagine. We excel at reconfiguring spaces to meet the needs of growing companies like yours.
MEET JANICE COONS: Janice assists clients seeking furniture for offices, healthcare, and higher education. Armed with her extensive knowledge of industry trends, she can help you enrich your office environment with great office furniture solutions! Connect with her via email janice@officefurniturenow.com or by calling 888-910-3769 x113. For more inspiration visit us on Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter!
