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Designing work environments has always been about creating, maintaining and changing cultures. But so often in the past this has been by default. A dominant utilitarian bias implied that the workplace was neutral: workers showed up at 9.00 am, did their work and left again at 5.00 pm to return totheir 'real' lives. The factthatthose workers spent a significant part of their lives at work, that their work was crucial in generating meaning in their lives and that many of their most significant relationships were work-based meant little when it came to creating workplaces.
This was also at a time when the focus was on the time spent at work rather than productivity as such. As a result, little regard was paid to the effect of lighting, what are now known as workstations or indeed any other environmental feature on the productivity of workers.
Recognition of the centrality of work in people's lives, the re-focusing on productivity and acknowledgement of the influence of working environments on workers' well-being and productivity has brought radical changes in approaches to workplace design. In short, it is now accepted that, for good or for bad, workplace design creates cultures and that workplace cultures determine the quality of output.
The recent fit-out for the recruitment company, Hamilton James and Bruce by Watermark is an example of the trend for companies to consciously re-shape their working culture through design. Now situated on Levels 11 and 12 of the Exchange Plaza in Sydney's financial district, HJB were coming out of a formal, old-fashioned office. Moreover, they were bringing two companies together into the same environment - one executive, the other contract recruitment -to form a single culture.
The emphasis throughout is on transparency and connection, with the work areas wrapping around the lift core in a continuous open plan and just a few offices pushed out to the corners of the plan. The Human Resources, IT and Finance section is separated from Personnel for security reasons, but
by a glazed wall so that the sense of continuous connection is maintained. With storage an issue (the keeping of extensive personal records), the stora e systems were integrated as
design features. Another issue was the potential acoustic problem of a call centre with a large number of people taking phone calls continuously. Here the reverberation is reduced by a lowered ceiling giving the space a remarkably subdued and calm atmosphere.
The spacious break-out area is Placed in the corner and separated from the work area by glazed walls. The area is designed to accommodate staff with early morning shifts who
have breakfast at work. It is also designed to double as an informal meeting space and to encourage interaction - hence, the banquette seating along the glass wall.
Level 12 incorporates reception, the boardroom and 24 interview and testing rooms. The view from reception was an unprepossessing one of the backs of other buildings. A
timber screen conceals this, along with some services, but still allows plenty of natural light to penetrate. The boardroom on the other (north-eastern) side has a much better view with
access to a terrace and can open up into a function space by using an operable wall separating it from an adjoining meeting room.
The interview rooms have been carefully designed to offer a range of room types - large/small, fast/slow - with their function facilitated not only by the size of the space, but also
by the furnishings, lighting and palettes. The feel is corporate, but relaxed to allow for the tensions of executive interviews with all the rooms treated acoustically.
Feedback indicates that this exercise in 'cultural engineering' has been a great success. The two cultures have been successfully merged and there have been significant
gains in productivity and staff retention.
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