Rooms with a view

Environmenatal and staff pressures are creating a whole new way of looking at the office workspace, bringing creativity to the fore

IN THE Santa Monica offices of leading US car-data website Edmunds.com the walls double as whiteboards and the conference rooms are garages. It's fun but also productive and it's a beacon for a new line in office design: improving productivity through radical workspace design. But does it work?

According to Edmunds' president and chief operating officer Avi Steinlauf the company wanted "to create a workspace that fosters openness and transparency consistent with our brand image and a great work environment full of formal and informal meeting spaces for our collaborative corporate culture".

One of the main pay-offs is a record low staff turnover for Edmunds.

"Two years after the completion and move-in we continue to get great feedback from employees, associates, partners, clients and vendors about what a great work environment it is," says Steinlauf.

Companies are recognising that staff turnover and the cost of hiring can be mitigated by spending on the office.

"Office building costs amount to only about 6 per cent a year of a firm's total costs," explains Cork-based architect Joshua Wheeler.

Wheeler previously practiced in California and has witnessed the transition in office design first hand.

"Staffing costs are inordinately higher so it's good business sense. There's also growing pressure from staff to take back control of their work environment," he says.

At Edmunds' the designers had a number of priorities, all centred on staff.

"The brief was to unite them and allow them to work in a space free from barriers," says Christopher Mitchell, design and managing principal at designers Studio Architects Los Angeles' office.

"No offices: only workstations. Tighter personal space is exchanged for open coffee bars, a game room - complete with driving games - and an open reception area which gives way to an open lunch room. The space was specifically designed for the staff and not for management nor outside clients," he says.

Pressure to create more exciting workspaces is partly a result of the shift towards a creative economy. Like many employees, Edmunds' staff spend long hours at computer terminals. Radical office design gets people looking up and interacting.

In the UK creative and environmental pressures are both driving forces in a new type of workspace design. "The main driver is always cost," explains Lara Conaway sustainability manager of award winning design firm Morgan Lovell who specialise in office redesign in retrofit projects.

"The issue of sustainability, reducing energy costs is also obvious. However, there is a big push to create spaces that foster the health and well being of staff," she says.

Conaway agrees that staffing costs are taking on a new importance. "Employers are looking for ways to reduce turnover and absenteeism as well as ways to attract people," she says.

She also points out though that a young generation of workers is seeking employers who are serious about the environment. These workers represent a generation who have been taught about recycling and global warming through school and university.

"They are looking for employers who are executing their environmental responsibilities," says Conaway.

Similar pressures are being felt in Ireland. "We haven't seen the creative industry cropping up as an issue yet," says Merritt Bucholz of Dublin architects Bucholz McEvoy.

"What we notice is the environmental consequentiality of design. In Ireland we are leading from that point of view," she says.

Those concerns were key to Bucholz McEvoy's designs for the enterprise software giant SAP's office complex in Co Galway.

"SAP is very innovative," says Bucholz. "They chose Galway as a location because they needed to sell a lifestyle choice to young employees. For SAP it is very important to keep creative and bright people around. They spend three months training each employee but the work can be a little dull. The work place has to be as stimulating as possible."

One theme running through the Edmunds, SAP and Morgan Lovell designs is access to a hub, a point in a building where people can naturally congregate. In the SAP Galway office Bucholz McEvoy took this a stage further by freeing up the temperature in the main intersection of the building.

"There's a growing desire for naturalness," says Bucholz, "a connection with the outdoors."

SAP's atrium area, where people meet for coffee, is allowed to function at a more natural temperature, "So you go out there and feel a freshness or warmth," according to Bucholz, depending on the seasons.

There are pressures other than creativity and the environment though. "We also see a leaning towards domesticity" says Conaway.

"For example in our offices we have a breakout space with a breakfast bar that can also be used for meetings and we have an area called the lounge with sofas and a Nintendo Wii so that staff can relax," she says.

To date in Ireland these pressures are translating into more comfortable or interesting spaces in the office spaces of multinationals or, as Merritt Bucholz points out, local authority buildings. Irish employers have been slow to catch on.

"I see more use of this design discipline as a method for addressing productivity issues in Ireland," says Joshua Wheeler.

With the financial downturn bearing down on the Irish economy maybe it's time to get creative with design.