How Your Business Center Design Can Drive Productivity

Published on January 17, 2013 - By Mike Sullivan

Workplace trends come and go – but many of them impact business centers as they do. Savvy business center operators are keeping tabs on workplace trends and seeking ways to leverage them to better serve clients.

With that in mind, Officing Today is kicking off a series of articles looking at some of the most relevant workplace trends for 2013 and how your business center can tap onto those trends to build your business.

In part one of this series, we’re looking at a key trend Sodexo, a world leader in quality of daily life solutions, identified: the built environment’s crucial role in organization performance.

The Crucial Role of Office Space
According to Sodexo, employers increasingly recognize the importance of the built environment in promoting better health, quality of life, and work-related engagement among their employees.

Sodexo interviewed two leaders in the field about the impact that environmental factors can have on employee health and engagement, and the role these outcomes play in supporting organizational performance. In those discussions, both LuAnn Heinen, vice president at National Business Group on Health and Richard Kadzis, vice president of Strategic Communications at CoreNet, concluded that environmental changes could strongly support employers’ efforts to improve employees’ health behaviors.

“Specifically, tactics that enhance the physical environment of the workplace, ensure its safety, and provide a wide range of programs that help employees manage work-life balance issues have a positive impact on employee health and engagement,” Sodexo says. “These outcomes bring about improved employee performance and effectiveness, which ultimately translates into long-term organizational success.”

Enhancing the Physical Environment
Business center operators that want to tap into the built environment’s crucial role in organizational performance should study up on ways to enhance the physical environment. That may mean including more open space, moving toward green offices, or redesigning the traffic flow of the interior. It could also mean updating old furniture and equipment or providing ergonomic accessories.

Business center operators can also invest in educating companies on how alternative workspace can help facilitate work-life balance. There are plenty of studies out there to validate the claim – and we’ve covered many of them. Savvy business centers roll those data points into their marketing messages and actively reach out to prospects with clear messages on how executive office suites, alternative office space, day offices, and meeting rooms can help employees achieve greater work-life balance.

Stay tuned for part two of this series on workplace trends and how they can benefit your business center.

Image shows interior of The Office Group’s Warnford Court, City of London