“I might have known,” said Eeyore. “After all, one can’t complain. I have my friends. Somebody spoke to me only yesterday. And was it last week or the week before that Rabbit bumped into me and said ‘Bother!’. The Social Round. Always something going on.”
(A.A.Milne)
There are rather a lot of people doing somewhat better than Eeyore. They are having quite a good Coronavirus, feeling secretly pleased with themselves and just a little guilty about things. After all, we are meant to be in a state of hardship; furloughed at best, probably angst ridden and missing our business colleagues.
All the same, it’s quite pleasant starting work in your dressing gown; slurping tea and crunching toast, dropping crumbs on your laptop. You can break for Pop Master at 10.30 with an early lunch if you feel peckish. The kids are glad to see you and your partner; well, what did GBS say about the maximum of temptation combined with the maximum of opportunity? And you still finish all your work in time to sit in front of The Crown of an evening.
It isn’t that way for many people of course, but science is completely on the side of Douglas MacGregor’s Theory Y, in-so-much-as people respond to being allowed to do things their way. Tom Postmes explains that if you give people the resources to do the job, trust them to do it right and the autonomy to do it their way, the results will be terrific. Since 2003, my own work has shown that staff in their own space, when allowed to develop their own solutions, always come up with the most productive result, leaving trained managers and consultants floundering in their wake.
So will there be a sea-change when the world emerges from its odd hibernation; now that Zoom is more than a song by Fat Larry’s Band and flexible working includes an afternoon nap followed by the determined purge of the inbox? Are we going to see a post-industrial working world of proper grown-ups, for the first time? Where the office is used as it should be; as a hub for information, socialising and resource gathering; as a welcoming base, a home from home? An office where staff arrive at times that allow them to do the job to their best abilities, taking holidays when they wish, changing their working environment to fit with their requirements? This is no soft option by the way; nobody is saying “reduce targets”.
Or, will we instead revert to the bleeding edge of flexible and agile managerial practice, developed as recently as the mid-18th century by Josiah Wedgwood. Will we rebuild the glittering principles of lean, introduced by the same man and honed to its precise modern standards by Frederick Taylor in the Victorian era? Or shall we just infantilize the workforce instead and give them pool tables, ping-pong bats and slides to play with. Biophilia, Six Sigma, and using populist psychometrics to inform office design, are all symptoms of the same nasty/nice continuum, where managers just look to buttress their control and untested heuristics through the manipulation of ‘experts’. And here is the entire list of peer-reviewed scientific articles that says this is a good idea. Ready?
That’s the lot.
Only business schools and business practice – supported by case-studies from within the, seemingly impermeable, business bubble – argue that the blunt and inexpert edge of current, and ever recycled, best practice cuts it. Science, in short, thinks it’s rubbish. So maybe, just maybe, we can start to treat workers like the grown-ups they really are. Science likes that and there is overwhelming evidence that it works.
If I am honest, I don’t think we will. We will probably slide back into gobble-de-gook, feelgood accreditations and back slapping awards, all of which butter corporate egos but are otherwise, essentially useless. It is a safe bet that managers will once more belt themselves into the pilot’s chair and paper over the windscreen with spreadsheets that misguide them and their colleagues towards the usual wrong variables (first two stops ‘error’ and ‘waste’ anybody?).
However, there are now tantalizing chinks of light that shine, almost illicitly, from behind some of the curtains of the coronavirus lockdown. Their tempting beams illuminating the path to workplace emancipation, well-being and profit.
Please, follow them; we may never have this chance again.
With thanks for this guest post to:
Craig Knight, Founding Director of Identity Realization
On the day when schools close for what may to working parents, seem like an eternity, I wanted to share with you my experience of 20 years working from home.
Over those years we raised two boys (now 17 and 21) and most of the time I’ve been able to retain my sanity, keep work going and, I like to think, turned out two fairly respectable young men.
So here are just a few things I hope will help.
Try to find a regular space in the house where you can set up a small work area. If you can’t do this, get a box with your work stuff and move it with you day by day. This keeps papers and laptops tidy and away from sticky fingers.
Plan ahead what you’ll be doing on a daily basis. Don’t get distracted. If there’s 10 things on your list, choose which one or two things you’d be most pleased to have achieved by the end of the day and focus on those. Anything that takes less than two minutes, just do.
Away from the disturbances and interruptions of the office, you’ll probably find you can be more productive and streamline your work schedule. Check Tim Ferriss’s work, in particular his first book The 4 Hour Work Week and the video below on ‘batching’.
You might well find you can achieve your 8 hour office day in half the time at home. Whether you choose to divulge that information to your boss is another thing.
Assuming you and your loved ones are keeping well, try looking at the current climate of isolation and Covid lockdown as something of a gift of time. Consider what, when we return to the New Normal, would you kick yourself for not having done during this time? It might be learning a new skill, catching up with paperwork, researching new material. At Workplace Trends we’ve just uploaded our back catalogue of conference video sessions to our new Vimeo channel. With 14 days free trial there’s plenty of time to explore subjects and speakers from most of our 2018 and 2019 conferences.
Bearing in mind that you might not need a full 8 hours to accomplish what you would normally do, choose the times that best suit you to work. Some people are early birds, and some are night owls, so fit your work into the times when the house is less busy and when you do your best work. For me, if I have a deadline, 6am – 10am gets me there, while the house is rising I can be beavering away (albeit in my pyjamas) Getting Stuff Done. Then if there’s more to do, another stint of 2pm – 6pm and I’ve had a pretty good day.
Make it firmly but kindly clear to family that this is your work area / work time, and unless fire or blood are involved, you’re not to be disturbed.
This is a time when families should pull together. If the burden of family cooking, house cleaning, domestic chores, falls on your shoulders, try to enlist children’s or your partner’s help.
That’s easier said than done of course, and if it’s more trouble than it’s worth to get someone else to unload the dishwasher, be seen to do those things yourself when others are around. They might take the hint, but if they don’t, in the grand scheme of things, it’s not the end of the world.
Online meeting and conference calls will be a requirement. Take some time before a scheduled meeting to set up and test the tech.
Learn where the audio mute and video buttons are and which way around they work. Don’t eat on the call. Chomping biscuits in a meeting at the office is fine, but online the chewing noise is magnified.
Take a minute also to check the light and background where you sit to make a video call. Natural light is best, and avoid having washing drying on the radiator behind you 😉
Just as you would at the office, take regular breaks. Five minutes every 45 minutes is a good rule of thumb to maintain productivity. Get a coffee, load that dishwasher, check in on the kids, water some plants.
Just because the H&S police aren’t likely to pass by your desk, you owe it to yourself and your family to make sure your environment is safe. Don’t overload plug sockets, watch where the wires trail, you know the drill.
Lastly, don’t feel guilty about using screens as baby sitters. A Disney or Star Wars film will be enjoyable for them, and give you a good 2 x 45 minute work slots. X-Box and Playstation are a little more difficult as they’re more of a rabbit warren with no beginning / middle / end. Set time allocations of use for the day and try steer kids away from them before bedtime.
Remember when the screens are off, it’s not a bad thing for children to be bored. It’s the only way they’ll learn to entertain themselves and be independent.
So I hope these pointers are of use for you: many of the tricks can also be applied to working in the office, so don’t forget them when we are all released back into the ‘real’ world!
Author: Maggie Procopi, co-founder and Director at Workplace Trends
The last decade has seen a number of changes in the structure of the average workforce. Advancements in technology, attitudes, and cultures are changing what it means to be a worker and what it means to run a business. As we are now into a new decade, we’ve seen hints of trends that will appear to be the new norm in the coming years. Here are some changes you are bound to see in 2020.
People have explored the idea of a four-day workweek for quite some time, but Microsoft Japan’s recent experiment proved it to be a success with productivity jumping by 40%. Not only did they see more work get accomplished and more goals met, meetings were also more efficient, more energy was saved, and workers were happier. At the centre of this concept is the idea of a work-life balance, and perhaps we will see more companies following suit.
Throughout the years, technology has established itself as an integral part of various businesses and industries, so much so that even during the hiring process some HR teams rely on it to streamline their recruitment efforts. In Comeet’s post on ‘What is an Applicant Tracking System (ATS)?’, David Markowitz discussed the use of this cloud-based technology to increase the overall efficiency of operations. Modern ATS can revolutionise the process with real-time communication, automation, and analysis.
Workplace Unlimited’s online survey found that the most important workplace condition among employees is related to flexibility. The option to work remotely falls under this, and more organisations are considering this as a viable option and smart management strategy––reducing costs and driving revenue. This also allows workers to become more productive and engaged as they can perform at their optimal levels when and where they choose best.
With environmental degradation and climate change on the rise, it makes sense for big entities like offices to make greener choices. Whether this is through minimizing paper usage, forgoing fax machines, recycling, or opting for LED bulbs, these small practices have greater weight when the entire company undertakes them. It is not only a good practice but contributes greatly to the company’s Corporate Social Responsibility, which today’s workforce deems an important factor in their choice of work.
The corporate ladder was once an ideal career trajectory among workers who equated climbing it to success. Solomon Thimothy of OneIMS has found that this hierarchal culture is beginning to change in correlation to people’s work attitudes. Diverse workforces show that people find success in avenues other than promotions: exploring other hobbies, having “side hustles,” and not solely making work the centre of their lives.
This post was contributed by Megan Brennan.
The debate on open plan versus enclosed offices rages on, but workplace design is not a such a simple dichotomy. Office occupants clearly have different workplace preferences, depending on factors like personality, personalisation, flexibility and sense of belonging etc.
This summer Herman Miller and Workplace Trends commissioned Workplace Unlimited to conduct a short on-line survey to help unravel some of the more personal factors underlying preferences in the modern office that are often forgotten or ignored.
The participants were asked to rate their preference for a number of office solutions. Overall we found:
When considering the current primary workplace of the respondents, those in private offices prefer private offices, whereas those in open plan, prefer open plan. It therefore appears that those who have not actually experienced open plan are more opposed to it, supporting the often observed “fear of the unknown”.
Similarly, home-workers prefer home-working. Furthermore, those with allocated desks have a higher preference for private offices and least prefer homeworking, hot-desking and agile working, compared to those who already hot-desk.
Preferences were also found to differ by personality. Introverts are more in favour of private offices and least prefer open plan, agile working and hot-desking compared to extroverts. Interestingly, there is little difference between introverts and extroverts in the preference for home-working; both groups rate home-working relatively high. There were fewer differences for those more neurotic and less emotionally stable.
Preferences were found to differ by some socio-demographic factors. Those in the UK rated open plan and landscaped offices higher than elsewhere. In contrast, Eastern Europeans and North Americans rated open plan offices low and private offices the highest.
No significant differences in office preferences were found for tenure or age group. So, previously reported differences in expectations of millennials etc are not supported. However, researchers do have a preference for private offices, which could influence their studies of open plan and resulting recommendations on office design.
The participants were asked to rate how important they consider 26 different workplace conditions. For example, flexibility over work hours and place of work, having a social workplace, being able to personalise the workspace and not being overheard or overlooked by colleagues. For all the respondents, the most important workplace conditions relate to flexibility. For those currently accommodated in private offices, concentration and windows are also considered important. Those who rate private offices as their preferred workplace, consider personal desk conditions, like personalisation and privacy, to be most important.
In contrast, such personal conditions are negatively correlated with those who have a higher preference for agile working and desk-sharing. For those who prefer landscaped offices and home working, flexibility and connectedness are more important. For those who prefer open plan, connectedness is important and for home-workers flexibility is key. These observed conditions could be used as motivators in workplace change management programmes
The above is a summary: the full report may be viewed here.
Branding specialist and Spacecraft Podcaster Dan Moscrop recently spent some time talking with workplace expert and psychologist Nigel Oseland. In the podcast they look at what people REALLY want at work; whether open plan is as rubbish as everyone says it is; how to use data to prove design works; and touch on Nigel’s current research projects with Lendlease and Herman Miller.
Towards the end of the podcast Dan and Nigel also kindly give a mention to our Workplace Trends: Towards a new era of work and workplace conference in London on 15 October. They’ll both be attending on the day and would love to pick up the conversation with you there!
Here’s the full podcast, and to hear more from Dan and his other Spacecraft Podcast sessions, subscribe to the feed here.
The debate on open plan versus enclosed offices rages on, but it’s not binary, it’s not black or white, it’s not a dichotomy.
Plus office occupants appear to have different preferences from the wide range of workplace design solutions that are available. We need to understand what drives these individual preferences. Is it factors like personality, personalisation, flexibility, sense of belonging and familiarity that affect where people prefer to work?
Together with partners Nigel Oseland of Workplace Unlimited, and Herman Miller, Workplace Trends is conducting independent research into people’s preferences for their work environments.
As part of the study we’d be very grateful if you could complete a short questionnaire. It takes less than ten minutes and as a thank you for your time you can choose to enter a prize draw for a free ticket to a Workplace Trends Conference and also to receive an early copy of our research report.
Please also share this page and our survey with your employees and colleagues!
Click here to take the Office Preferences Survey
PS Registration for our next London Workplace Trends Conference is open now – will you be there?
Today, 4 million UK citizens are choosing to work from home. For most remote workers, bonding online is a great way to bring the team closer together despite the distance. However, many Fortune 1000 companies are revamping the way they run their virtual teams.
The lack of interaction between remote teams is one of the biggest disadvantages as they can affect the overall performance of the company. In addition, the bond between colleagues can make a difference in team morale and satisfaction – both online and off. So, what can team leaders do to improve the bonding factors even beyond time zones? Boost remote employee relationships with team building activities, of course.
Video conferencing is one of the least, yet essential features needed by remote teams. In fact, it is one of the most useful tools to build trust with each other online. So, why not make it part of your team building routine? Set aside 30 minutes for a video meeting every 2 – 4 weeks. The goal is to have everyone join in and get an update from all team members about what’s working and what isn’t.
In addition, a dedicated channel on Slack will give members a place to share photos, discuss group issues, share their work, and connect with everyone on the team. If you plan to connect with everyone, set up a specific time for all members to be online to discuss challenges, weekly tasks, or give recognition.
For remote teams located within the same region, planning an annual teambuilding trip is a great option to ‘get out and explore’ without traveling too far. Once you’ve set your area, an activity like geocaching provides a unique opportunity to spend a day outdoors with colleagues that you wouldn’t have been able to do otherwise. If the company cannot provide GPS devices, there are simple apps that groups can download. When choosing your cache, aim to simplify the process by avoiding any items that will be difficult to find. Instead, use tickets that can be traded once a geocache is tracked. You can also include messages such as puzzles or riddles for teams to find to make the outdoor activity more exciting.
Whenever an employee attends a conference useful to the team, ask them to present a summarized presentation of what they learned. Whether the team is located within the same region or in different time zones, invite the team to sign in the online group discussion. To help encourage the team to join in, management can purchase a reloadable gift card or bonus fund to use towards a virtual lunch during the presentation. That way, the whole company benefits from the conference and the ideas gained from it.
Team building shouldn’t be limited to non-remote companies. Members who work remotely don’t have to miss out on the “water cooler experience” of a physical workplace. Instead, use these tactics to keep teams in sync, productive, and ultimately strengthen the bond beyond time zones.
Author: freelance writer Lucy Wyndham
Photo by rawpixel on Unsplash
PS- Don’t forget to book your place at our Workplace Trends London Conference, 17 October 2018! #CircularEconomy #ArtificialIntelligence #ActiveWorking #Biophilia #MachineLearning #SensoryProcessing and more! Click here for all info.
Virtual reality is fast on its way to becoming the defining technology of the current decade. That’s a fairly serious label, and it will have competition when we look back in another 10 years. But already we’ve seen VR progress from a fun adaptation of an old idea aimed at gamers to a multi-functional technology with implications across – essentially – our entire way of life. It’s not quite time to buy in yet to the science fiction vision of the near future in which we’re all strapped into VR all of the time. But at the same time, it’s probably appropriate to get used to the idea of VR easing its way into your life, and this will be happening in the workplace as well as in your personal space and time.
There may in fact be dozens of things that change about the workplace of the near future as VR is implemented to streamline practices and improve atmospheres. For now though, these are three of the changes you should expect to see.
Most of us think about virtual reality all wrong. We think about it in terms of actions. For gamers, it’s what it might be like to shoot an alien in virtual space; for artists, how to paint on a canvas that doesn’t exist; for film lovers, how to approach an iconic character in a simulation. These are all thrilling aspects of the technology. But if we really look at how it’s evolved thus far, the core of it is environment. Some of the most impressive trajectory in this regard can be seen in the particular game genres that comprise online casinos. Digital slot reels, once undeniably bland, made waves by advancing to 3D just a few years ago, and have since already moved on to virtual reality. The technology took a flat, boring style of gaming and turned it into an interactive experience in which any individual title could provide its own unique surroundings for the player.
That may seem oddly specific, but think of it in the context of workplace communications and remote contributions and imagine the leaps you could make in VR. We’ve already turned telephone calls and emails into live chat spaces (like Slack), conference calls, and remote presentations. But even then you’re interacting with a screen or a line of text, etc. In virtual reality, group participation across distances would be every bit as effective as the leap from 3D gaming to virtual gaming. We would be in the same environment as co-workers, interacting as if in actual space. Surroundings, in this sense, matter, and they’re just what VR will provide.
Here again, we’re talking about the environment VR can provide, in this case as a sort of test run for organizing a real space. If you’ve been paying attention for the last 10 months or so, augmented reality has actually made a lot of waves as relates to home and office design. The idea is that through AR programs, you can use a simple mobile phone to look through furniture inventories from real retailers, and then position your phone to show virtual renderings of your choices in your actual room. It’s an impressive idea and a very fun way to use AR – though again, here we’re talking mostly about turning something 2D into something 3D.
The next step is the arrangement of whole rooms in virtual space, and/or the ability to browse fake virtual spaces. While this may not seem like the most vital practice for a workplace, the technology will enable those in charge of offices themselves to sample different layouts, test out ideas, and ultimately come up with the most ergonomic, employee-friendly designs for workplaces. And as we know, a better workspace can improve productivity.
Another piece about how VR will change the workplace (which made some excellent points of its own) noted the creation of safe testing and training environments as one of the perks. This is certainly an interesting point, and one that gets past the idea of environmental consideration and into actual office practices. It’s also a simpler point, because the specifics depend so much on what kind of workplace we’re talking about and what sort of work is being done. Speaking broadly however, the pure ability of VR to produce simulations allows for very effective on-the-job training, whether for new employees learning new skills or for existing employees going through HR programs.
Author: freelance writer/content editor Jacob Saunders
PS- Don’t forget to book your place at our Workplace Trends London Conference, 17 October 2018! #CircularEconomy #ArtificialIntelligence #ActiveWorking #Biophilia #MachineLearning #SensoryProcessing and more! Click here for all info.
As digital natives, millennials in the workplace grew up in the first generation of laptops, smartphones, and tablets. Today, it is quickly growing as the future of business with more than four million remote workers in the UK. Their ability to embrace innovation and handle mobile technology offer unique career opportunities and businesses. A recent report by The Modern Workplace 2018, showed that workers from many countries are choosing to spend more time working from home or during their travels. Meanwhile, the UK is comparatively slow in embracing these changes, which could negatively impact worker satisfaction.
With millennials continuing to be the driving force behind this career change, remote work has quickly shifted from short-lived trends to a booming practice in thousands of companies across the globe. Approximately 77% of millennials believe that flexible work hours are key to boosting career satisfaction and productivity, while 37% are, or are currently planning to, work on their own.
These are digital natives that grew up in a world full of technology. They are also diverse, and Gen Z has been forced to face many global issues that previous generations struggled with, such as immigration, same-sex marriage, alternative sexual lifestyles, equal gender pay, and more. However, the most distinctive characteristic of Gen Z is their sense of entrepreneurship. Here are some reasons why millennials and technology are changing the future workplace.
According to the 2017 Deloitte Millennial Survey, research states that two out of three millennials claim their employers have adapted to flexible work arrangements. They found that the greater the flexibility, the higher the results were in company satisfaction, productivity, and engagement among millennial employees. In the United Kingdom, 37% of companies offer flexibility for their staff. While the number of flexible employees continues to grow, so do the hours of team collaboration lost and the lack of human contact. As a result, the rise of working from home and flexible hours has led to an increased investment in Skype or video conferencing chats. However, younger millennials are keen on being productive outside the traditional 9-5 job and working anywhere with Wi-Fi.
According to Adam Smiley Poswolsky, workplace speaker and best-selling author, it is the flexibility of the hours you’re working that defines the role you have. Experts say that, in order to strengthen your candidacy, you must tailor your resume to each remote job that you apply to. Looking outside of the physical limitations of the company allows candidates the freedom to apply and provide a diverse pool of applicants. While the millennial generation continues to raise its influence and demands, our competitive nature allows us to work and solve problems, interact, and develop communication in multiple cultures and languages.
Companies with a remote staff have the opportunity to save money and invest in training. The term “smart working,” allows individuals the freedom to work away from the office, at home, local café, or as they travel. This will enable employees to stay connected no matter where they are located across the globe. As Generation Z continues to enhance its technological skills, we will continue to see the increased adoption of team communication and collaboration tools, whether they are used in the workplace or online.
While the nature of the workplace has changed dramatically within the past decade, the advancement in technology is moving faster than ever. It is estimated that technology will increase up to 32% more from where it is now. This will impact every aspect of management – from how businesses retain and attract employees to how employees communicate and collaborate.
Due to the powerful advancements in communication and technology, moving the physical workplace online will enable the millennial generation to combine life between work and home, as well as achieve balance in both. While our human needs are to be social and collaborate as a team, balancing flexibility and discipline is the key to a successful remote workplace.
Author: freelance writer Lucy Wyndham
Photo by NeONBRAND on Unsplash
Author: freelance writer Lucy Wyndham
The number of seniors 65 and older in the workforce has increased in the past couple decades according to the Pew Research Center. 34 percent of older adults would like to work from home, and 74 percent want more work flexibility. Offering remote positions allows golden-agers to delay retirement and continue working.
There is an increase in how long employees are spending working remotely. Between 2012 and 2016, the percentage of employees who work from home one day or less per week decreased from 34 to 25. At the same time, the proportion of those who worked four or five days per week remotely rose 7 percentage points to 31 percent.
In Europe and the United States, a rising proportion of young professionals have used technology to live a nomadic lifestyle and work remotely. One of the biggest drivers of workplace change is virtual teams and flexible work. 37 percent of respondents to a recent Gallup poll reported working virtually at some point.
Two out of three younger workers said the option to work from home would greatly increase their interest in an employer. The survey noted that policies that promote a fun, casual, and flexible work atmosphere have a positive impact on which employers young people chose. The opportunity to work remotely adds to how attractive a company seems and its ability to retain staff for a longer average duration.
According to research from the Harvard Business Review, people who work from home are more engaged with bosses and colleagues than in-house workers. The main difference here is the many tech tools at your disposal. Video conferencing has a lot to do with this.
Employees and employers alike find that working from home boosts productivity. This is because impromptu meetings, loud colleagues, and water cooler talk doesn’t slow things down. About 67 percent of supervisors say remote workers increase productivity overall.
As we learn to use technology to improve the remote workplace environment, the benefits are likely to increase. It only makes sense for organisations and individuals to take advantage of these perks.