The last part of our series is here and the last of the findings that will change the way you design your next office project. What does research say about calling and privacy?
12. 10. 2018
In a recent Senator´s survey commissioned to find out how the UK office population prefer to work and evaluated the current approach to office design with the aim to establish how we differ individually in our preferences to everyday tasks. Senator found that no matter which office trends and technological changes affect the way we conduct work, one thing that will always stay a constant is how we would choose to communicate over the phone.
This might not always be apparent in the modern office, where the rise of email and text use has built offices in which colleagues often correspond via technology within the same space instead of speaking to each other.
Why do we do this? It could simply be due to the current generational workforce being so accustomed to communicating via text that email is the most familiar method to communicate, or people are more confident of getting their points across when they are written down. But for all of the new technological innovations, many businesses still understand that there are few methods of communication more efficient and effective than picking up the phone.
Research has already established the preconceptions many office designers and employers have about their workforces love for open plan offices, which provide no privacy in their environments, to concentrate. But what the research further highlights is an employee’s need for private spaces when on the phone, whether mobile or fixed landline, 60 per cent of those surveyed would prefer to not be sat at a desk. This brings the role of solitary spaces and of telecommunications into a new perspective, as the issue with phone use has more to do with privacy than other employee habits.
The research found that 81 per cent of employees would prefer to be alone when speaking on the telephone regardless of the technology, with 60 per cent wanting physical shielding when they are conducting the call. This should be an alarming result for companies that require their workforce to spend a significant time on the phone and do not have isolated breakout spaces for them to conduct these calls, as it has the potential to delay the organisation’s day to day processes.
Senator´s research also established that the more senior the position in the organisation led to the increased preference for privacy, with 48 per cent of senior managers preferring to be in an enclosed space while on the telephone. But still the greatest desire for privacy throughout the whole UK workforce is when working on tasks that require focus and concentration.
These findings could now influence new trends in the design of office space, as businesses could achieve a surge in productivity by further adapting and changing the layout, design and furniture selection within offices. Physically, this could translate into more incorporation of private areas or development of screen technologies to provide private spaces for telephone calls to be taken.
