How to create an ideal office space

In 2020, you could have been forgiven for thinking that the world of work had changed for good. As economies toppled into lockdown, organisations found themselves under acute pressure to accommodate remote workers. A seismic cultural and technical shift was underway with many hailing working from home as “the new normal”—one that was very likely here to stay.

Yet, in the years since the pandemic, opinions have shifted again. As early as 2002, the likes of X, Apple and then Google led the charge on bringing workers back in person, some even mandating Return to the Office as a contractual obligation. Since then, the debate on when and how often employees should come into the workplace has gathered global momentum, with firms progressively hardening their stance on in-person work—the belief being that remote working harms things like productivity and organisational culture. A global survey by KPMG found that 64% of bosses expected their workers to be back in the office five days a week by 2026.

This raises a few questions, of course, among them: do workplaces actually enhance culture, productivity and other desirable outcomes? And if so, what kinds of workplaces do they need to be?

Shedding light on this is Assistant Professor of Strategy and Entrepreneurship at London Business School, Bukky Akinsanmi Oyedeji. A trained architect herself with years of experience in architectural consulting with Fortune 500 companies, she has led a detailed and comprehensive analysis of decades’ worth of critical research into physical work environments, and their impact on workers, teams and external stakeholders.

What she finds is that workspaces can have both positive and negative effects on workers and their ability to accomplish tasks, as well as repercussions for a firm’s reputation, cachet and standing with prospective employees, suppliers and clients.

The office through an architectural lens

Together with Yea Hee Ko of Singapore Management University and Carnegie Mellon’s Sunkee Lee, Bukky synthesised the findings of thousands of academic articles, research papers and empirical studies from the worlds of business, psychology, architecture, urban studies, sociology, political science, and environmental science. To marshall all this data into structured insights, she led her colleagues in devising a matrix using architectural concepts.

First, they identified three dimensions along which office workspaces may be experienced: ambience, spatial configuration and aesthetics. Then they analysed the data and showed that these three dimensions influence two critical areas for businesses: how workspaces support or hamper employees’ ability to do their work; and then, how they impact a firm’s resource position—from physical things like running costs, to intangibles such as its corporate image and appeal to potential workers.

In architecture, ambience refers to the characteristics that make a space habitable and safe, such as temperature and lighting, air quality and sound levels, explains Bukky. Meanwhile, spatial configuration relates to the way spaces are organised and laid out: things like wall partitions and the arrangement of desks or furniture. Aesthetics, she says, are sensory and design elements—the textures and colours, finishes and materials that characterise a physical space.

“Ambience affects the overall level of comfort we feel, as well as physiological and cognitive processes, while spatial configuration determines both the way we move through a space and the interactions that we have within it,” says Bukky. “Aesthetics then play a crucial role in creating an environment that feels inviting and stimulating—or not—which also impacts our psychological wellbeing.”

According to the research, all three dimensions are critical determinants of productivity because they impact physical and mental health, attitudes and motivation and work processes: whether workers are able to concentrate effectively, the quality of interpersonal communication and organisational coordination. Then there’s resource position.

“We see a clear correlation in the literature between ambience, spatial configuration and aesthetics and financial and human capital resources,” says Bukky. “This ranges from the costs of running a space that is energy efficient or not, one that is robust or in constant need of repairs, how your space impacts things like absenteeism and staff retention, and on into the cues and signals that you send to all kinds of other stakeholders, from suppliers to investors: your legitimacy as an organisation.”

Together, this forms a matrix.

Key insights

Crunching all the data, Bukky and her colleagues are able to pinpoint some insights for leaders and decisionmakers; findings that should be on their radar as they encourage workers back into the office with a view to boosting productivity and optimising resources.

1. Lighten up and air things out

Lighting has a determining effect on how people feel and work, individually and together. Too much—office lighting exceeding 2,000 lux—is strongly tied to health risks, while excessively dim spaces can cause sensory inundation, undermining wellbeing and increasing turnover. Some of the research also suggests that darker workspaces yield more in-group conflict and harm collaboration. Natural sunlight is known to alleviate seasonal disorder symptoms and in the office setting can help reduce job strain and stress. Appropriate lighting, good air quality and thermal comfort are linked to higher levels of employee satisfaction and engagement.

Acoustics matter too. At the individual level, too much noise can interfere with cognitive functions and negatively impact performance. Interestingly though, at the group or organisational level, the susurration of colleagues or hum of background noise can also provide certain auditory cues around social connection and belonging that foster engagement rather than disruption.

And in terms of resources, forward-thinking firms might also want to look at what energy-efficient measures might best contribute to cost savings. The research highlights organisations in the utilities sector as early adopters of low-energy technologies yielding strong financial benefits to firms over the years.

2. Make the space

While open plan offices can mitigate hierarchical or siloed work processes, encouraging greater interaction, knowledge-sharing and collaboration, they can also amplify background noise from conversations or meetings that interfere with cognitive processes, leading to stress. New research have started exploring a broader range of office design that moves beyond the closed-open-plan dichotomy, focusing instead on activity-based, flexible, and hot-desking setups, with diverse workspaces tailored to the needs of different types of work—private rooms and soundproof booths to house focused work, for instance. Meanwhile, access to shared amenities like bathrooms, dining areas, storage facilities have been shown to positively impact employee engagement.

Rethinking the spatial configuration of the office in terms of work and activity-related needs should arguably also be a function of maintaining or reducing real-estate and operational costs, while potentially boosting market value.

3. Be creative

When employees feel they can decorate their own workspaces with items that carry positive personal associations—family photos, memorabilia—it encourages wellbeing as well as a sense of ownership and control over their environment that can carry into the work and productivity. And the addition of aesthetic elements, such as plants or colourful paintings, has been shown to help shape a more supportive dynamic in the workplace.

Meanwhile, new data has found that less conventional designs and décor—vibrantly painted walls, unusual lighting fixtures or furniture, playful spaces or areas –can also enhance more creative, divergent thinking. By creating positive stimuli, carefully-curated aesthetics can contribute to an environment that supports creativity and task accomplishment, while sending signals to external stakeholders such as clients, prospective, partners or suppliers around positivity, inclusion, innovation and consideration.

4. Go green

When assessing the options in (re)designing workspaces that foster wellbeing and productivity, a good policy might be to opt for green and sustainable designs that reduce building life-cycle costs, while conferring intangible resources such as industry, community and prospective employee goodwill.

In any case, says Bukky, getting all of this right is a balancing act; one that is contingent on assessing certain trade-offs, and weighing up the pros of installing a new lighting system to boost staff morale and productivity, say, against the cons of increased operating expenses. Above all, she says, understanding how your organisation creates value is absolutely critical.

“I think it behoves most businesses to stop and think about the work they do, how they do that work and where the value is created within the organisation. Ask yourself: what can you do remotely and what do you do that requires people to be there physically? What kinds of energy do you need people to feel in their work? And what are the behaviours and processes that you need to create value,” says Bukky.

“There really is no one-size fits all in optimising your workplace for your employees. The key is to figure out what your people need to deliver value, and how you design to meet those needs.”