Commercial Integrator March 2023 - 44

Office of the Future
Designing the Office
Space of Tomorrow
These days, few knowledge workers want to commute to a private office
to sit and do emails. Thus, office designs must be mindful, intentional and
evolved. By Michael Goldman
FOR DECADES, people have talked about the office of the
future. Manufacturers and technologists would present new
products and concepts to solve challenges and attempt to
tweak and improve the experience in and around the office we
had become familiar with over the years.
Some companies broke new ground (and much glass) by
introducing a paradigm shift to " open offices " and/or shared
resources. In retrospect, however, that shift, which took place
at some companies, pales in comparison to the ideas and
concepts being discussed today during conversations about
bringing people back to the office.
A Catalyst for Change
The pandemic was a catalyst for significant change. Companies,
teams and people had to quickly adapt to new technology,
strategies and methods just to get work done. Innovation
and technology enabled us to change our workflow,
bridge gaps and, in some cases, improve efficiency. Timelines
for technology rollouts and user adoption accelerated, and
what usually took years to accomplish ended up being rolled
out in months.
Typically, people don't like change because it's uncomfortable.
But, when we didn't have the option of communicating
in person, online chat and video calls became " how we work. "
Accordingly, many employees grew accustomed to working
remotely and its benefits. However, at the same time, many
missed the social aspect of being with others.
Videoconferencing and collaboration platforms became
common household names. As time went on, work hours
became more flexible, geographic distance became less
important and people working from home began tailoring
their environment to meet their unique and personal needs.
For many people, the commute that bookended their day
disappeared. But now, three years later, many believe that it's
time for another change - namely, a return to the office.
In the years before the pandemic, discussion in the
commercial AV industry about the office of the future was
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Commercial Integrator MARCH 2023
dominated by talk about products and ideas to help people
find and reserve space; monitor and manage their physical
resources (e.g., codecs, displays); and equip huddle rooms
with monitors and wireless presentation appliances. Today's
discussion is different because, when we return to the office,
we will do so with a new way to accomplish work. Additionally,
people became accustomed to working in an environment
suited for them.
Beyond the Latest Widgets
To that end, the conversation about the office of the future
must expand beyond simply the latest widgets. It must be
a more comprehensive or holistic conversation about a
reboot of the office space, people and technology so that it
can support these new ways of working and the needs of a
diverse workforce.
Businesses have been formed to study companies and
provide leadership with the data they need to make better
decisions about their spaces. This includes information
about design, square-footage requirements and policies to
maximize return on investment. I recently spoke with Dan
Jackson, co-founder and head of product for Calven, a
workplace-experience-platform company, about the office of
the future. I sought to glean any insights he could share.
The purpose of the office is to support the corporate
strategy, and almost every company's operations strategy
has changed in the last three years. The change isn't finished
yet, either. Companies have figured out the mechanics of
communicating remotely, but they're still working out how to
measure output effectively, how to align the divisions of the
company remotely and how to train a distributed workforce.
As part of the reboot, the office must be flexible enough to
support the teams using the space both for today and for
what might happen in the future.
Team strategies vary within a company. Not all teams
within a company work the same way. Calven has found
that some individual teams within one organization woulcommercialintegrator.com
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