Is the idea of office monogamy a thing of the past? Is one worker on one desk a concept we should have left in the 20th Century?
Hot desking was the first office trend to satisfy our nomadic spirit, but recently we’ve been seeing an increased desire for off-site working, and not just on away days – with ‘coffee shop working’ no longer the exclusive domain of the creative freelancer. Now everybody wants a piece of the action.
Sejal Parekh (@triflecreative) is a Director at Trifle Creative, a creative workspace design company.
We are often asked to create and capture the ‘feel’ that a coffee shop provides within an office environment. When done well, these areas can encourage cross-company pollination, facilitate real-life social networking, and give staff different kinds of areas that allow for different kinds of working, all under the guise of what we call ‘social working’, whether that’s in the office or out and about.
Social working allows you to step out of your routine, enabling you to work in a different way, away from the confines of your desk or the usual meeting rooms. It’s not just about being somewhere with ‘buzz’ or seemingly more lively, its about a complimentary work environment for the task in hand. And we know that putting yourself into a new environment can challenge you, giving fresh perspective and stimulus. (Ed. note: see Jim Ware’s series for the WorkSnug blog, Knowledge Work and Space.)
Have a look around the environment you and your people are in - what role does it play in motivating you and your team? What flexibility does it offer? And finally - is there good coffee?
Maybe its time to go outside and bring some of that goodness back in!
Supported by Plantronics. Simply Smarter Communication solutions for the Mobile Professional
Photo credit: Dennis Wong
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