Tag Archives: Strategy design

Will Instagram displace Apple as the great strategic story of the decade?

The most important part of the Instagram story may not be the billion dollar purchase prize, but the transformational influence that Kodak’s failure in the light of Instagram’s success may have on corporate strategy and design.

Corporate cultures are influenced by short horizons. In a recent Forbes assessment of the Kodak bankruptcy, Larry Keeley observed this condition –

At least once a week, top executives tell me that new growth businesses in their firms are intriguing and potentially important, but they simply “don’t move the needle.” Said in plain American: “The hot new thing simply cannot produce enough revenues this quarter to improve my bonus as a senior executive.” So those projects are starved of resources instead of nurtured.

And in the New York Times, Nick Bilton observes that –

Even if Polaroid or Kodak could have developed Instagram, it’s likely that the project would have been killed anyway. What would be the reaction of almost any executive presented with a business plan to save the company with an iPhone app that had no prospect for revenue?

We’ve become very interested in this concept of “stock and flow” from other influences, but highlighted by the Instagram story.

What are your experiences with this “stock and flow” pattern?

How car dealers uncovered a surprising key to greater customer satisfaction

February 10, 2012

architecture, Design strategy, innovation, Strategy design, workplace design

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from Factory Image Programs: A NADA Research Project

One of the more active and heated debates on the value of design to business is over what are called “factory image programs” for car dealerships.

Most car manufacturers, concerned about the alignment of dealership appearance with their product programs, periodically impose or strongly influence updates to the physical quality and character of dealers’ facilities. Most dealers resist the programs because they are unable to link a measurable business benefit like increased sales to the high cost of these programs.

So the National Automobile Dealers Association (NADA) commissioned an independent study to uncover and identify the value in the programs and recommend a resolution to the ongoing conflict between them and the manufacturers. The study was just released at the annual NADA convention a couple of days ago.

I expect I’ll return to comment further on the study in the near future. But I did want to offer an initial and very interesting out-take from the study.

After discussing the diverse and complex array of considerations and influences that made solid conclusions almost impossible to derive, and especially after uncovering that the annual costs of billions of dollars spent on dealership facilities meant very little, if anything, to people buying the cars, the study uncovered an unanticipated yet solidly expressed value in the programs.

…dealers expressed pleasant surprise that, after they completed a store upgrade, it became much easier to attract, retain, and motivate good staff. One multi-point dealer even told us that “I modernize as much to attract good staff as to impress the customers.” Another pointed out that with improved employee morale came improved CSI scores, which makes sense. The impact seemed especially powerful in the service area: as one interviewee put it: “A dropped ceiling in the service bays will do wonders in attracting and retaining good technicians, who are pretty used otherwise to being ignored.”

Despite the experiential evidence that there was this direct link between employee satisfaction and customer satisfaction (CSI = Customer Satisfaction Index), there apparently has been no survey by the manufactures or the dealer association to uncover and verify these anecdotal, and logical, findings.

And I think that’s where I’ll return in future commentary. I have some significant experience in factory image programs and have consistently been surprised with the fact that they align things (store fixtures) with things (car designs) but not the real experiences with and in these things.

That to me is the most important point of this study, affirming what we know from other places. The real power of workplace design lies not in the “brand image” but in the experiences of work. The quality and character of the workplace directly links to attraction, engagement, morale, motivation and performance of good employees, and that directly links to quality and character of the customer’s experience with the organization.

The NADA has, in other words, discovered what we’ve said in so many other places – the leading organizations of the future will be the ones who “own” the experiences of work.

Getting out of groupthink and into pursuing opportunities

February 5, 2012

architecture, Design strategy, innovation, social design, Strategy design, workplace design

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Lego Flying Car by katimar via flickr.com

There has been a lot of conversation in recent days about the form of the office and how to design it for those who work in it. This is enormously interesting to me because this conversation, like many others in culture, politics and business, is an exciting signal of the search for real innovation and of a desire for a revolution in the way we provide the places and spaces where we do the things we do.

Argument and revolution

The “conversation” that I reference is the point and counterpoint in recent debates about which way is best – the old comfortable way or a recent newly proposed and tested way. A round of confirming and contradicting commentary was recently evoked by Susan Cain’s article in the New York Times. While trying to make a case for consideration of the closeting needs of introverts, she broadly bashed the new, open workplace as a product of “groupthink” in its pejorative connotation. Using the same term in almost the same week, Jonah Lehrer referenced the incredible volume of creative product emerging from the famous Building 20 at MIT, “one of the most creative environments of all time,” generally credited to the informal interactions happening between people of different backgrounds and interests. And Alison Arlieff weighed in with the groupthink that collaborative spaces aren’t all they’re cracked up to be. Closed office vs. open office.

The “revolution” that I reference is my belief that a third form with a new language will emerge. This third form will have immediate credibility in the forehead-slapping “of course” mode and will make both of the currently debated forms artifacts in a rapidly receding history.

Getting out of groupthink – New forms will be generated from a new lexicon

I propose that the current arguments are nostalgic and a bit arrogant. They are arguments of an estate that recognizes it has lost its case but does not yet know where to turn. And they are arguments of a self-appointed enlightened who believe that the right way is the way they proposed to counter the old way but is now being uncovered as having had insufficient rigor, and that now has piles of data bias making a great case against it.

I think that the core issue we are now confronting arises from the loss of meaning of familiar terms like “office” and “workplace” and, even, “work.” “Office” is a term left over in the slow evolution from industrialization and carried the implications of production and supervision in its form. Attendance, for example, was a key characteristic of its managerial mode. “Workplace” implied a single setting, the place where work was done, the place that was separate from the other stuff we did, the place that was defined by time, location and character. “Work” was something separate from “life” and disregarded the reality that, even in the old mold, one defined the quality of the other.

In almost every meaningful, productive, and rewarding context now, these terms are antique.

“Work” certainly has changed dramatically from the dreary and dreaded stuff we did for “the man.” Most of what we call work, the valuable stuff, is creative in some form. Most of what we do is self-defined or collaboratively determined with a team oriented to a goal that is more frequently something defined by them and not by a manager.

There is no single “workplace” any more because we do what we do in multiple physical settings and multiple virtual settings, as well. Time, also, is no longer a limiter in what we do. We carry huge amounts of information on tiny devices everywhere we go, and we connect with our networks anywhere we are. In an odd inversion, we may find solitude and focus sitting with our headphones on in a public cafe and, when we are ready for socializing our ideas and learning from others, we go to the office.

The office best serves as a place for connecting with a network of knowledge and resources to get purposeful stuff done. The productive social buzz and innovative activity that now takes place there is called “distraction” and blamed on an “open” office by those who claim a value of “focus” to name whatever it is that they do behind their six-foot tall cubicle walls. They are missing the reality that entitled square footage for playing computerized solitaire never had, and now certainly no longer has, value. They miss that the work that is valuable is not the consumption of time but the generation of new ideas and approaches with a team of other highly motivated people. Those people, when they need focus, find a place for focus. Otherwise, the buzz of collaborative activity is the visible manifestation of the generation of value for the world.

Pursuing opportunities

Arguing about which of the existing ways of designing a workplace is wasteful. It is a form of the groupthink that the debaters debate. Work is no longer done in one place, and the office is no longer one thing.

Reflecting on what we do, and how we really do it, and then generating, testing and developing new environments for the activities and behaviors of work is productive and valuable.

As Kevin Kelly says, “Don’t solve problems; pursue opportunities.”

The office as an App, redux

February 4, 2012

architecture, Design strategy, Houses, innovation, social design, Strategy design, sustainability, workplace design

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use case study house via davidgalbraith.org

David Galbraith offers an interesting vision for the transformation of thinking about and designing houses. My interest is less in the specifics of his design, but more in the consideration of this approach to almost any space where we live or work.

We continuously accept a lexicon of form – “living room,” “dining room,” “office” – that no longer appropriately serves the way that we live. We accept these forms and functions because they may be the only choices the market makes available to us, or because of social norms that we feel we cannot challenge or do not know how to challenge, or because they are imposed upon us by another authority.

Considering how what we do would be expressed in a web app offers a context for insights into how work and life could flow better and satisfy more.

The web apps we select to download or use are those that are well designed both in visual and functional character. We appreciate mostly those that are agile in character, that reduce complexity, that are light in system demands, that have a simple logic at points of decision, that flow well. We appreciate those that provide, when we want or need it, a link to augmenting or amplifying information or features. We choose the ones we like because of the quality of the experiences we have with them, which are mostly engaging and efficient.

I don’t recall that we’ve had a client who has approached us with an initial and core request to provide a better experience. Most typically, the language that accompanies the commission is an oblique goal metric like reduced square feet per person that occludes the real goal of the organization to become more engaging for the people who do its work and more effective in achieving its purpose.

Many of the tools and techniques our profession has attempted to use to move our client’s language into experiential considerations work only where experience is the business – in retail and hospitality contexts, for example. Clients in corporate, scientific, or institutional domains typically squirm at the imprecision of an experiential parameter.

Why do people who carefully choose and use web apps use an entirely different language and criteria when commissioning the places and spaces where they live and work? Why is more thinking and emotion invested in an app that costs next to nothing, but nothing of similar critical thinking applied to the experiences in the spaces that cost millions? Could the use of the Web App metaphor be a more effective tool in transforming thinking, perceptions and investments?

Ghost innovation

January 10, 2012

architecture, Design strategy, innovation, social design, Strategy design, workplace design

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Ghost innovation

This is part of a map plotting various planned but unbuilt subway lines in New York City. Reading it unveils an understanding of past strategies, plans, and objectives that became abandoned due to budget constraints, maintenance priorities and other demands that diverted and then buried the vision. Reading it inspires an imagination of the world that could have been, of a society that might have developed differently, of connections that might have had value but were lost through an inability to efficiently and effectively connect.

Stranded innovation

It reminded me of a recent client, a major consumer products manufacturer and marketer who held what they called a “stranded innovation fair.” It was their belief that, regardless of the circumstances for the loss of attention to or development of these innovations with our application, they might have real value in other contexts, times, combinations or applications. The more that people in the company were aware of these ghost innovations and technologies, the greater would be the potential of their eventual application and productivity.

Hidden talent

In a similar context, some companies are experimenting with rich profiles of the people in their organizations and utilizing certain social media applications to promote those profiles to others in the enterprise. There are people in most organizations with valuable skills and capabilities that are overlooked in the usual day-to-day of operations, or who may have some special skill buried deeper in a resume and unexploited in their current job description or project assignments. By circulating those profiles or using other means to communicate them, these organizations are better able to match the right people with the right projects, achieve goals more efficiently, and gain competitive advantage through otherwise overlooked internal skills and talents.

How can the design of the workspace contribute?

Imagine the potential that lies inside of an organization that is for many reasons consistently overlooked. More interestingly, imagine the power of an organization that has the insight to look back, or look deeper, or promote ghost innovations differently.

Technology may be the more powerful tool for uncovering and developing ghost innovation, but imagine the potential of a more social workplace, as well. How much of knowledge and potential, of skills and innovations, are lost each day due to the inability of people to connect efficiently, to observe others, to understand weak signals, to join a conversation with others.

In their book on the organization and architecture of innovation, Allen and Henn point to the power of work spaces designed in way to support our awareness of others and to increase the potential for our connections with each other.

We think this is the defining challenge for our time.

How can the design of the workspace contribute?

Think big – Grand visions are connected visions. They illustrate for others a path to future development and value, and tend to garner greater support. Even if the final accomplishment falls short, the grand vision leaves “remnants of foresight” that provide others a way to interpret and extend intentions and uncover latent value at the appropriate times.

Redesign the organization before redesigning the workspace – The traditional lexicon of the corporation – organizational charts and individual job descriptions – do not describe the way that work is really done today. If you believe that teamwork and collaboration are the key to higher organizational performance (and they are) then design the organization around those attributes. That redesign will generate a new lexicon of organizational form that the planners and designers of the workspace can leverage for high performance through great work experiences.

Make visible the artifacts and activities of network connections and collaboration – As with the organization, the workspace has to speak to teamwork if collaborative cultures are to flourish. The traditional lexicon of the workspace, like that of org charts and job descriptions, perpetuates forms that are about individuals and managerial controls. The creative workspace is an open and networked space, where team activity and process flows are visible, and adaptable and agile to the dynamics of projects.

If there is any single rule that guides our work for organizations seeking enhanced performance and higher levels of innovation, it is this – Make it visible.

Makers of virtual meeting spaces make them in face-to-face space

November 21, 2011

architecture, Design strategy, Strategy design, workplace design

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Photo by Citrix via Adam Richardson

Perhaps relevant to our last post is this delightful interview by Adam Richardson that I found in a guest blog at the Harvard Business Review. Citrix, the makers of GoToMeeting, have a new collaboration space where the leading work in their innovation process is done. It is fascinating how the makers of virtual work spaces develop their process in carefully considered face-to-face space.

It is not a “crappy” space, and this is how they describe its benefits:

Opening the design collaboration space was a big milestone on our design thinking journey. It’s already played a key role in fostering a more collaborative culture that involves less over-the-wall processes, fewer silos, more and earlier collaboration, and better integration of design into the product development process.

We needed to create a shift in behaviors, and realized this would be best achieved by having people live the change, not just being told about it. The space facilitates this.

Perhaps most significantly, it seems to lie at that upper quadrant of my not-yet-finished diagram in our last post. That upper quadrant is where I speculate that “signature” form but “occupy the workplace” space can generate high performance and engagement.

The interior design is quite minimal. The “beauty” of the space comes from the work that happens inside it: sketches, flow charts, Post-Its full of blue-sky ideas, new product concepts from raw idea to real formation. The space was intentionally left not-too-perfect, so people are encouraged to manipulate it, not be precious about it. It’s intended to serve as a canvas for creative thinking. It’s also very flexible and can quickly change from working studio to lecture room.

It seems also to fit some speculation we were developing about “auto-updating” space.

Like all good design, iteration is part of the process. We have discovered that we do need a better system for engaging remote participants and better ways for capturing brainstorming and meeting notes in real time, so that others can see them later. This is something we are investigating for our next “release” in 2012.

Richardson’s interview is packed with information. I found at least 10 principles for a workplace designed for innovation –

Align the design with your mission – with the “why” and not just the “what” of your business
Relevance to all disciplines supports multidisciplinary work better
Recognize that space shapes the behaviors you want
Your space is an indicator of the authenticity of your purpose
Agile and adaptable space is more valuable than CRE-regulated space
Anytime space supports creativity better than assigned and scheduled space
Casual space supports sharing and trust better
Authentic space recruits
Learn from others and engage users on your design team
Good design strategy reinforces good strategy design

Let me know your thoughts on the article, and your own experience.

10 ideas for better design competitions that inform better projects, too

July 24, 2011

architecture, Design strategy, Strategy design, workplace design

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Situationist Drawing Device Exploded Diagram by Ji Soo Han

The go-nogo debate, when considering responding to a Request for Proposal, includes an assessment of the capacity of the firm to respond to the context of the request. That is, do we have the ability to respond with sufficient ideational and representational robustness to deliver what the client seeks? Can we get what they want done done in the time they want it done?

The RFP we were considering had at least one member of our team saying no. I think the measure of his response was based on a conventional method of developing a project and the sequences of development, presentation and approval.

I took a different tack, and thought that the time frame demanded an approach similar to developing a submission to a design competition. Competitions, never sufficiently resourced, demand an energy and focus that is distinct from normal project processes. We produce creative and innovative ideas and use critical and spare methods to present them in a very compressed time.

It made me wonder, also, why we do not use such effective processes in the normal course of our work.

Coincidentally, writing in the Design Observer, John Thackara reflected on his experience as a juror in design competitions. He observed ten faults in the way competitions are staged, and offered ten suggestions for improvement.

I offer a link to them here, because I think that his suggestions to improve the process also inform the way we do our work in other contexts. In a quick companion to Thackara’s list, here are some rough starter thoughts of our own:

Consider the client’s design brief, his program, as a challenge. If we haven’t written the program, it is probable that it does not contain much of an articulation of what the client is trying to do and why. Nor will it contain much about how the client sees themselves and their project in a larger context of business, society, culture and history. We, however, have been brought into our profession with a rich background that places architecture and its practice in that larger context. We are also critical, in a thoughtful way, about how much of the world around us could be improved. Why not approach our client’s project in this way?
Take the opportunity to develop a rich set of internal connections, seeing the project not just for production, but also for development. The time and fees that set the context for project design and delivery are immediately limiting and compromising. They force us to focus on deliberate and efficient processes, and the team is set to produce. Projects, however, offer the opportunity for rich connections between people and great opportunities to develop and improve skills and aptitudes. There is no compromise to the project and, indeed, great probable benefit to it by paying attention to individual and team development opportunities as the project progresses.
Identify something in the project brief that evokes attention and commitment to meaningfully advance the quality of daily life. Every day, millions of people do things in the buildings we design. Make thoughts about how their lives are enriched or improved by designing the life of the building after occupancy, and not just the processes that put it on the earth.
Invite other disciplines as co-designers, not just as consultants. We tend to parcel out tasks to consultants whom we’ve invited to the project for their own perceptions, knowledge and reflection. Using them as co-designers, however, enriches what we do and what we can achieve by drawing them to a great intimacy with the purpose and mission of the project.
Consider the project beyond its footprint. Every building exists in, is influenced by and, in turn, influences a broader context of connections over time. Consider the building as a tool and understand how, beyond occupancy, it can assist what others are trying to do , as well.
Research the real world. If we engage in research before designing, we tend to look at typologies, styles and solutions. But the projects we look at have themselves been commissioned to do certain things and, as we know, have influenced other moves that may not have been initially intended. Seeing them and learning from them in this real world context can contribute considerations for a much more robust design solution.
Make stories about life in the building, not just about the development of form. We can improve the performance of our clients, the return on their resources and their own development as patrons by imagining the life that people will live in these environment, and telling stories that inform why certain design decisions were made with those stories in consideration.
Discuss the criteria for success with the client. Help him develop his own critical mindset about a more meaningful future in the process.
Engage others. We once invited friends of our designers to come to a presentation of our work and offered them the opportunity to comment on it. I do not know why we do not do this more. We engage the support of others on our Boards. why not engage generous outsiders to perform a similar role of adviser or commentator on what we do?
Engage project management as stewardship. Beyond the management, application and control of ours and our clients resources on projects (on time, on budget) consider the longer life, role and importance of the building and act as stewards of its success.

As always, I’ll appreciate hearing your thoughts. What can we learn from our experience with design competitions to inform how we approach projects in daily work?

The Meredith Workplace Attraction Curve

July 13, 2011

Design strategy, Strategy design, workplace design

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I propose that a significant increase in the performance of people and value in corporate real estate could be captured and delivered through a more customizable workplace.

There are many models around to illustrate how personal activation, amplification or augmentation of provided platforms yields high levels of satisfaction and performance enhancements. Simple examples include the phone in your pocket. Over time, you have explored and tested various “apps” to get your device to be just right for you and what you want to achieve. The device not only looks the way you want it to, but has functionality and features that you selected and the data that use use more frequently. The apps you chose also enhance the way you interact with other people, other systems, and the physical world. Your device, through its customization, is more useful, attractive and valuable to you.

The place where you work probably has very little of these benefits. The workplace is a place of constraint, not of augmentation. Standards and benchmarks for the planning of the workplace define generalized patterns related to positions rather than roles, and to organizations rather than activities. My workstation is a compromise of size, configuration, technology, location, comfort, etc. I have a sense that if I were provided less, but then able to pull up certain physical and technological “apps,” I’d be more satisfied and effective.

Hence, this graph, the Meredith Workplace Attraction Curve, as a representation of a theory and opportunity for exploration and development. I propose that the workplace defined by others has rapidly diminishing return. A workplace that is designed by its users can deliver accelerating returns to people and place.

Push platforms and diminishing returns

“Push platforms” are the kinds of workplaces as designed and delivered conventionally, typically by Corporate Real Estate. One of the defining characteristics of this type of workplace is its diminishing acceptance as more and more people participate in it.

“Distraction” is the almost universal claim representing an underlying fault in the design and delivery of this kind of workplace. The demand for freedom from distraction comes from the inadequacy of the physical workplace to support effectiveness, and is a claim that begs separation – walls, doors, mobility.

At a certain point, the internal separation reduces the meaning and purpose of being in a workplace. Where alternatives are available, people will choose them as preferable to their purposes, and bail out of the provided workplace. This selection is the manifestation and fulfillment of policy that values space reduction over worker potential.

Pull platforms and increasing returns

“Pull platforms” are new types of workplaces we’ve referenced before and have these characteristics –

A “plug-and-play” nature designed for the convenience of its users, rather than its providers
Modularity, that is, with components that are both self sustaining and compatible for connection with others
Flexibility, able to respond to otherwise unanticipated needs of its users and participants
Agility and adaptability, with features that allow it to support and capture increasing returns
Evolutionary with the potential for its value to be enhanced by the improvisation, experimentation and improvements generated by its users
Environmental richness, providing intrinsic rewards to those who are committed to its use and contribute to its value

This type of workplace, inherently attractive to those who seek higher levels of contribution and performance, has an increasing value curve. The more that customization to purpose satisfies personal and organizational effectiveness, the more people are attracted to it. The more people who are attracted to it, the greater the points of connection of the social network of work and the higher probability of growth in personal and organizational potential as a result.

The tipping points

Distraction in the push platforms is a function of scale and proportion – too many people in a space reduces its effectiveness and causes “evaporative cooling.”

However, “distraction” in pull platforms occurs when there are too few people engaged. The intentional collaboration and synergies cannot take place until a critical mass catalyzes an energy and a corresponding acceleration in value as more people connect to the network and in the working space.

Quote from Chris Hood in the July 2011 issue of Buildings magazine

8 growth principles companies can learn from mavericks

June 22, 2011

Strategy design

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Currently living MIT graduates may have spawned more than 25,000 companies and contributed almost $2 trillion to the global economy. I was surprised and inspired by this statistic as reported in this recent article by Ed Pilkington in the Guardian about maverick genius that characterizes MIT.

As many American companies now sit in a trough of performance, constraining operations, resisting hiring and approaching stagnation, it made me wonder what there is to learn from this culture that has had such a successful performance track. Are there clues here to how companies or communities can can develop a track to greater success and contribution? In Pilkington’s article I found at least 8 key principles to nurturing a culture of innovation, influence and growth.

Purpose
The challenge ahead for America is well-framed in the article by MIT’s President, Susan Hockfield. She expresses great concern about the “deficit of ambition” in the United States and a fear that the future may belong to others. Observing the level of activity taking place in Asia, she says that “you feel the pulse of people racing to a future they are going to invent. You feel that rarely any more in the US.” This concern and anxiety about leadership helps shape the institution’s mission and purpose to be “a beacon of inspiration…to create a brighter future for the world.” Consider what you do as part of the fabric of society.

Shaping a mission around advancing our world and engaging people through a profound commitment to that mission can generate that kind of energy that is transforming the globe so rapidly.

Practice – and research and practice
“Students are not so much taught as engaged and inspired.” Consider how MIT’s characteristic blend of hands-on experimentation and craftsmanship with research and intellect can engage and inspire the people in your organization.

How much of what you do is defined by policy or procedure without having drawn those who deliver for you into the experience of developing solutions?

Personality
Pilkington discovers a culture of mavericks, hackers and eccentrics at MIT, the kinds of characters you’d expect in places of creative exploration. But he also finds the paradox of the presence of a prominent antiwar activist in an institution that is known for the development of military technology. Tolerate a diversity of individual styles and behaviors.

When you hire, challenge your template for cultural fit when what you really seek are cultural misfits.

Power – and influence
Pilkington quotes an MIT professor saying, “If you come up with a brilliant idea, that’s OK. If you win a Nobel prize for your research, that’s fine. But if you take that idea and apply it and make something transformative happen, then in MIT that’s deeply admired.”

Consider the opportunity for transforming how things are done in your domain in each project you undertake.

Prototyping
The presence of a classical cello in a lab with sensors and other electronic gear is a catalyst to a diversity of creative developments. By intention, it is an artifact of a project to build a new kind of instrument for the classical musician, Yo Yo Ma. By accident it evolved also into an entirely different application for the pop star, Prince. An through that diversion, it became the inspiration for the development of the popular video game that turns everybody into rock stars, Rock Guitar.

Places that are rich with apparently random resources and cast-offs from other projects seem to have great potential to generate new ideas and applications through play, observations, testing and accident.Consider the importance of the presence of artifacts in your workplace.

Place
There is much in Pilkington’s article about the character of the places and spaces housing the creative geniuses of MIT. Place is both anonymous – “there is precious little about the place that is obvious” – as well as iconic and evocative – “formed from undulating polished steel and tumbling blocks of brushed aluminium that reminds Berners-Lee, he tells me, of the higgledy-piggledy Italian village one of his relatives grew up in.” The architecture, in other words, is not so much an intentional statement of institutional identity as it is an expressive abstraction of the nature of its community and therefore a tool to support, reflect and inspire the individuals who work and develop innovations there.

Design for the unique and differential experiences of work.

Pull
MIT achieves what it does because it first developed a culture of creativity and innovation, and then let that culture act as a magnet for others. People who want to achieve great things are drawn to MIT because other people who have developed great things developed them there.

Consider the power of the stories of the creative people of your organization. These tend to be stories also about environments open to experimentation and exploration, attractive attributes to people committed to purpose and a drive to bring new things into the world.

Philosophy
Do it boldly.

The Big Shift – Why Class A Office Space is Now Irrelevant

April 3, 2011

Strategy design, workplace design

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For the past couple of years, there has been hopeful anticipation in the real estate and architecture professions that improvement in the economy will yield new jobs and that those jobs will, as they have traditionally, drive real estate demand. As in this report from Architect magazine, there is very little in the hope, anticipation, analysis and discussion that reflects the big shift that was taking place before the Great Recession began and that, I expect, will only accelerate now that the economy appears to be improving.

The state of the art in workplace design in the last decade has reflected a focus on “performance” as a key goal or metric. The definition of the term varied greatly depending on context and time. I recall that it arose first in the domains of human resources as a reflection on an imperative to enhance the context of work to engage employees and enhance their performance as “knowledge workers.” In a relatively short time, the term was used to reflect the imperative to capture the output of the “high performance” workforce, becoming, in other words, a new term for the conventional preoccupation with metrics for productivity.

The term was taken up in the real estate domain to then reflect the financial performance of a real estate portfolio or bundle of leases. In this context, performance was about maximizing the occupancy of a property, or reducing the area per person dedicated to the places where people worked.

This led then to a progressive redefinition of the workplace, the development of workplace performance indexes driving comparative space standards with diminishing returns and then, through advances in technology and the capture of generational social trends, into “mobility” programs through which a new standard of “performance” emerged: butts per seat.

In the meantime, significant other changes influencing the world of work were taking place. The flexibilities and freedoms of mobile technology, an increasingly networked workforce, the ability to focus on purpose rather than production, and the rise of the power of small and agile organizations began to look less like an outlying cultural change and began move with momentum into mainstream consideration. In other places, there has been considerable conversation around the concept of a “jobless recovery” or at least an economy without the usual correlation with jobs and space.

This matters to me because I believe that the anxiety over the past two years and the urgency to deliver the evidence of recovery seems to be overriding and suppressing the opportunity to think about work in different ways. I believe we have an opportunity to extend the Big Shift, and consider a move from conventional metrics of performance to new attributes (I hesitate to say, metrics) of potential. I think this is a matter both of significantly reduced and realigned demand, and also of new perceptions and definitions of quality.

In this shift, “Class A Office,” which defines a financial equation, will mislead those who are considering a new workspace and perpetuate a form that has little relevance to the new or emerging ways of working. More critically, “Class A Office” represents a way of thinking that raises place over purpose. The dominance of the term in conventional parlance makes the object a goal and diverts attention from the attributes of a new economy that is focused on purpose.

I’ll return to this subject in some upcoming posts. I will propose that new ways of working require new ways of thinking about space, that there are great benefits in reconsidering people before place, and that new metrics for the emerging workforce will be shaped around the experience of working which evokes new approaches to the portfolio of places where it occurs.

—archizoo

The blog of MEREDITH Strategy & Design

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Tag Archives: Strategy design

How car dealers uncovered a surprising key to greater customer satisfaction

Makers of virtual meeting spaces make them in face-to-face space

10 ideas for better design competitions that inform better projects, too