IS YOUR OFFICE A WASTE OF SPACE?
AN OPPORTUNITY
Among our survey group, in traditional office environments personal workstations were unused 42% of the time. That means that for a business of 250 people, with a 1:1 ratio of employees to workstations, 105 workstations would sit empty at any one time.
Since the average workstation takes up 4m2, 105 empty workstations is the equivalent of 420m2 in idle floor space. And in an era where efficiency is the watchword, with many CFOs charging their managers to do more with less, this wastage represents a significant opportunity.
An agile advantage
In the average office described by our research, an employees to workstations ratio of 1:1 is clearly unnecessarily high; they could get away with 10:6 (6 workstations for every ten employees). Replacing personal workstations at a 1:1 ratio with shared desks at a 10:6 ratio would free up an enormous amount of floor space which could then be used for something else – either a number of alternative, more appropriate work settings (meeting rooms, soft seating, concentration areas and so on), or additional desks to accommodate more staff, or a combination of the two. Alternatively, calculating that the business only needs two thirds of its existing footprint might allow it to downsize and make considerable savings.
Moving to a more agile approach to office planning therefore presents a number of different opportunities, depending on the needs of the business, which is where Kinnarps’ Next Office® consultancy can help. Next Office helps you answer two crucial questions:
How agile can you go?
In the scenario described above, an employee to workstation ratio of 10:6 was a realistic minimum. But that’s not a hard-and-fast rule; the ratio will change for different businesses, and even different departments within the same business. And there’s no necessity to drive straight for the minimum. While 10:6 might be realistic, 10:7 might be more comfortable. Next Office® helps you calculate the degree of agility that’s right for your business.
Once you’ve calculated how much space can be saved by stripping out superfluous personal workstations, you can then decide what to do with it. Again, this will vary between businesses. For some, an array of small bookable meeting rooms would be appropriate. For others, informal meeting spaces and soft seating would be better. Businesses experiencing a rapid increase in headcount might need to spec more hot desks. In order to know which suits your business best you need some rich data to analyse.
Start the process
The Next Office® process engages both management and staff, utilising staff workshops, an online survey and a user app to give you an unmatched understanding of how your offices are currently used and how your staff would like to work. We can then propose furniture solutions which meet real business needs.
To begin your agile journey, simply get in touch...
