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- How innovations affect the organization of staff work?
- What types of innovations can be in offices?
- How large companies implement innovations in office space?
John Seely Brown, Co-Chairman of the Deloitte Center and former chief scientist at Xerox, says that innovative companies have three characteristics: visionary leadership, organizational commitment to breakthrough thinking and a place that supports the work of innovation.
In this article, we answer the question: “Is it worth investing in innovation for the office?” And we also give examples of possible innovations in the office space.
Innovation for the office: what is it?
Innovation is an invention created by human intellectual activity. The main task of innovation is to ensure qualitative growth of efficiency, leading to an increase in profits. Any innovation, including the office one, gives a qualitative change of working processes, allows to increase efficiency, to receive the result of high quality, to raise the prestige of the company.
The use of innovations in the organization of office space gives a few more advantages:
- Ergonomic, stylish and attractive space.
- Preservation of employees’ health.
- Increasing the number of new breakthrough ideas.
Let’s consider in more detail and on examples, what innovations in the office are and how large companies introduced innovations for their offices.
Open space
One of the first innovations for the office, which were introduced in many large companies, were large free spaces where employees are accommodated and where the workflow becomes fully open. This approach allows employees to communicate openly with each other, to offer ideas, to listen to each employee, regardless of his or her level. An idea can come from above and below.
Google is a great example of such a free workflow. Their huge New York office is more like an entertainment center. Instead of strict offices – game rooms, various kitchenettes with snacks and healthy food.
Innovations for privacy in the office
The workflow, organized in large open spaces, as a way of fast communication, openness and teamwork have yielded good results, today it is used in almost all large companies. But in the pursuit of corporate dreams, one should not forget about personal space. Having personal space, the employee feels calm and confident.
Innovations have also reached the way of organizing an individual workplace. What new technologies offer here and what results can be achieved with their adoption? Let’s take a look at specific examples.
Office partitions with a controller
The easiest way to keep employees away from each other, thus creating an important and necessary personal space, is to put up a desktop partition. What is innovative about it? It’s simple – a partition with adjustable transparency. If you need to focus on solving a problem, make a blank partition. If you need to solve a problem with a colleague quickly and calmly – increase transparency and establish visual contact without getting out of the workplace.
Office in the office
This technology allows you to create separate offices within the workspace. It is convenient and quick to install fabric-covered partition system including sohomod reception desks with acoustic and noise insulation properties. Such a system can be used to organize a separate office, kitchen area, conference room or any other room.
Telephone boxes
Another innovative development is the telephone box in the office. Here you can be alone for negotiations and still stay in the office space. This technological solution has everything for comfortable negotiations: Internet access, ventilation, and air conditioning, electricity. And complete noise insulation does not distract colleagues from the work processes.
Such booths are installed in the offices of many large companies: Google, the Dublin office of Airbnb and many others.
Hut designs
The hut is another way to create a secluded space. The lightweight, mobile design allows for the design of a room for any purpose. This cabin will be a great place to take a break from work and reboot. For more convenience, small sofas or comfortable sack chairs can be placed inside. If desired, you can put a table and an armchair, having equipped the house with another workstation. And you can put a coffee machine and brainstorm over a coffee break in a small secluded space.
Twitter’s headquarters use 100-year-old huts of the Wild West for lunch breaks. The log huts fit perfectly into the San Francisco office interior and create a pleasant atmosphere.
Art innovations for the office
If you want to attract the best people to your team, think about how to make your office attractive. This can be influenced not only by the convenience of the latest models of equipment but also by the design of the premises. When you come to the offices of Facebook, Selgas Cano, Google, Inventionland Design Factory, Nokia, you want to stay here. Working in such conditions becomes a dream for someone.
Creative office design becomes a dream for a professional whose skills and knowledge will bring millions of dollars in profits. Implementation of such office innovations can be started from the simplest point of view – the use of wall panels with original design and various functionalities. For example, some panels can be used to make important notes. “Bright, stylish, functional” is the motto of office space art innovation. If an employee uses GoBag, an innovative bag to move office stuff, he or she will have everything he or she needs to get started immediately. And Primo telescopic armchairs will make it possible to turn a lounge into a conference room at any time.
The walls of one of the most creative offices “Yandex” in St. Petersburg are painted with formulas, which every SEO-supporter dreams of getting.
Conclusion
Innovation in an office is an inevitable change that will come to any workflow sooner or later. The 21st century is a century of human resources, thoughts, and ideas, so to make the most of it, we need to create a comfortable working environment, actively using new innovative solutions.
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