When you last moved your offices, did you take into consideration what would work best for your staff? Did you consider the age and work style of your staff and what environment would make them the most productive in your business?
If you have followed our blog and read our previous blog “Don’t Forget to tell Staff you’re Moving your Office Space Toronto” you will see one example of how sometimes your staff can get lost in the details of acquiring new digs for your business. While the story of an office tenant moving offices internally and forgetting to inform a new staffer might seem amusing, there are a few other things to consider when choosing a new office.
If your staff is mostly a younger generation that has grown up with technology, you may want to look for office space that has more personal advantages, such as layouts that serve more collaborative work styles, or a lounge area that may yield an edge in terms of staff productivity. Remember that generation X & Y workers are tech-savvy because they have grown up with technology all around them. This generation of workers relies heavily on technology to get the work done, and are known for performing best with little or no supervision in a collaborative environment. They function best when they are given feedback on finished projects rather than feeling that they are under constant watch while performing their duties. So finding office space that allows for collaboration and creativity can be very important to productivity.
In 2008, Gensler (a leading global architecture, design, planning, and strategic consulting firm that partners with companies to achieve measurable business and organizational goals through design) published a study that revealed a direct link between greater collaboration and higher profits. According to the study, employees at top-performing businesses spend 23% more time working together than average companies. Then in 2013, Gensler’s U.S. Workplace Survey revealed that only one in four U.S. office workers are working in optimal workplace environments. This means that the rest are struggling to work effectively, thus resulting in lost productivity, lost innovation and lost worker engagement. Also, according to the 2013 Gensler survey results “Employers who offer choice in when and where to work have workers who are 12% more satisfied with their jobs.”
A recent tenant at Telsec Business Centres needed a flexible, collaborative team-space office for 5 people, as well as a private office equipped with work surfaces where one, two or even three areas could be set up as breakaway team space. The breakaway office could be used for specialized projects or used for non-collaborative times when staff need solitude. The key to the success of this model is that all of the staff work on laptop computers and tablets, with all of their files stored on a cloud server. The other key to the flexibility of the office space is that not all of the staff is in the office at any one time – as they also offer flex hours and days for staff members to work from home or anywhere else they feel they can be productive. Another contributing factor to productivity is that even the business owner does not have a private office, but works right alongside his staff as part of a team.
The advantage of office business centres is that they can offer various-sized work spaces that can be configured with various types of furniture to suit the client’s needs. Based on the changing needs of the offices space for lease Toronto tenant, the office and furniture can also be reconfigured at any time very quickly.