Beyond Four Walls and a Door:
Understanding Privacy in the Office (293KB PDF)
When people need privacy to do their work and don't get it, they report significantly lower productivity and job satisfaction compared to those who say they have the privacy they need. Conventional wisdom suggests enclosed offices would address the issue, but this ignores research that indicates floor-to-ceiling walls and a closable door don't necessarily translate into privacy. In one study, people defined privacy primarily by the ability to own a "territory." According to an office consultant, "High-quality work settings allow people to control contacts and to have a choice about when and how much interaction they have with others."
Bright Idea:
Personal Control for Office Lighting (112KB PDF)
While people prefer natural light, their workplaces, for obvious practical reasons, are lit by some combination of daylighting (perhaps with views to the outside) and artificial lighting. Within that range of illumination, people have clear preferences for how much and what kind of light they want. The fact that preferences vary--among people and for the same person at various times during the day--argues for giving them some control. Whatever else people say about office lighting, they make it clear they want the ability to adjust it themselves. And they will adjust it quite differently based on the quality and visual performance of local lighting, ambient lighting, and daylighting. Giving people control over their lighting helps them feel more satisfied with their workplace. It affects their performance, too, helping them to stay engaged in tasks longer and to avoid fatigue. Proper lighting can also increase energy savings if adjustability is part of the picture.
Churn Reconsidered (171KB PDF)
Since the beginning of white-collar work, organizations have moved their people and furnishings around within facilities and from one location to another. Companies track these changes as "churn." Churn is the number of office moves during a given year, expressed as a percentage of the total number of offices occupied. Primary drivers for churn are reorganization, routine change, expansion, and consolidation. Strategic planning provides an effective way to deal with churn. Other tactics include universal planning, movable walls, flexible furnishings, wireless technology, and alternative workplace strategies. Churn will always be with us. But in the future, the need for it will decrease as technology makes interiors more dynamic.
Creating a Culture of Sustainability:
How Campuses Are Taking the Lead (195KB PDF)
The influences of sustainability efforts, large or small, can change a student's educational experience, a staff or faculty member's commitment to the college, and a community's awareness of its ecological responsibility. Sustainability initiatives seen on college and university campuses throughout the country are influencing curriculum decisions, operations budgets, facility plans, and campus culture. Students, faculty, and staff are leading the efforts. They often find it to be difficult work, requiring the kind of campus-wide coordination and cooperation that's often absent from the organizational structure of higher education institutions. Yet while the approaches and participants vary, all share a common motivation--to do the right thing.
Embracing Boomers:
How Workplace Design for Maturing Knowledge Workers Benefits Everyone (974KB PDF)
The baby boomer generation is staying healthier and more active--and working longer--than any generation before it. This trend is occurring just as many companies are realizing the value of employing maturing workers. For these workers to contribute their fullest, they will likely require workplace modifications and schedule adjustments that address the changes aging brings--a decline in vision, hearing, or muscle strength and dexterity; an increase in cognition time required to process and recall information. A concept called universal design holds promise for meeting the needs of older workers. It proposes that as many people as possible be able to use a product or environment. To do this, universal design takes the full range of human limitations and disabilities into account. The lesson from these efforts is clear--creating environments for aging eyes, tools that require less strength to operate, and workspaces positioned at heights appropriate for an aging body also benefits younger workers.
Equal Opportunity Facilities:
Designing for Universal Accommodation (309KB PDF)
Supporting people at work is the obvious and admirable goal of facility design. But several developments in recent years have complicated formerly assumed notions of who working people are, what they look like, and what their bodies can do.
Healthcare Facility Issues: Standards Guidelines Mean Simplicity, Savings, Sanity (67KB PDF)
Using a consistent set of standards can help people perform better by allowing them to focus on tasks, handle change gracefully, budget accurately, and keep costs down.
Healthier Planet, Healthier People:
Hospitals Go Green to "First, Do No Harm" (872KB PDF)
Societal discontent at healthcare's contribution to dioxin and mercury contamination became the impetus for the greening of the industry, a movement that's been picking up speed since the mid 1990s. Mindful of their mandate to "first, do no harm," hospitals are taking a hard look at their operations and construction practices, determined to align both with their fundamental mission. From improving indoor air quality to seeking green suppliers to designing sustainable buildings, healthcare has come to the collective conclusion that it's time to clean house. After all, there's something incongruous about healing people only to return them to a sick planet.
It's a Matter of Balance
Acoustics in the Open Plan (171KB PDF)
Acoustically comfortable spaces must account for human reactions to sound as well as the physics of acoustics. That's because a person's perception and interpretation of sound in the work environment, not its decibel level, determines its distracting and annoying effects. One way to help people focus on doing their jobs is to control the spreading sound waves generated by other people doing their jobs. This requires controlling sounds at their place of origin, as they travel, or when they arrive at a listener's workstation. Three specific techniques can be applied during facility planning and in application to deal with sound waves as they travel between sources and receivers--sound absorption, sound blocking, and sound masking. Selecting appropriate components, ceiling and carpeting treatments, and sound-masking systems supplemented with voice-privacy components can achieve a favorable balance for the office soundscape.
Sound Practices:
Noise Control in the Healthcare Environment (185KB PDF)
Unwanted sound can have a negative impact on patient outcomes and caregiver effectiveness. Speech privacy is crucial to protecting patient rights under HIPAA. However, recent studies show that hospital noise levels have increased significantly over the past five decades. Understanding the basics of sound transmission and measurement is essential to a realistic assessment of a facility's sound environment. Environmental design strategies for noise reduction and sound management include the maintenance and replacement of hospital equipment; the layout and acoustical treatment of patient rooms, nurses' stations, and corridors; and the implementation of emerging technologies to mask sound, reduce speech intelligibility, and introduce healing sound into the environment.
The Siren Song of Multitasking (248KB PDF)
Rapidly evolving technologies deliver more information and provide more opportunity for connection than ever before. Worried they might miss something important, workers are multitasking, even though cognitive research shows that it takes significantly longer to do two tasks at the same time than it does to do them one at a time. In reality, multitasking decreases productivity, increases stress and workplace tension, and affects quality of thought. Researchers are exploring how workers stay focused on one task, as well as the techniques they use to recover quickly from interruptions. While environments that provide quiet spaces for thinking can help, workers themselves have to be willing to shut off technology.
Vision and the Computerized Office (1080KB PDF)
When people rely on a Video Display Terminal (VDT) screen to do the majority of their work, for extended periods of their workday, vision symptoms often result. Optometrists and ergonomists use the term Computer Vision Syndrome (CVS) to describe these symptoms, which occur in 75 to 90 percent of computer workers. CVS symptoms may include eyestrain, headaches, blurred vision, dry and irritated eyes, neck and/or back aches, and light sensitivity. Vision experts agree that less-than-ideal workplace conditions and screen technology can exacerbate these problems, and that ergonomic interventions must be part of the solution. Suggestions for addressing these conditions give organizations practical ways to improve their workers' visual health and allow people to work to their full potential.
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