Practice what we preach

After the lockdown and the shift in how we work, it became clear that our workspace was no longer fit for purpose - I'm sure many others share the same challenge.

We now operate under a hybrid working model, with a minimum of two days in the office with your team, while the rest of the week is flexible. We come together for Pizza Friday on the last Friday of each month; our regular Group update.

However, with fixed desk locations, we noticed that parts of the office were underutilised and lacked a sense of community. Additionally, as many of us spent much of the day on team calls, privacy was often compromised, and the noise disturbed others.

Over the past few months, we've redesigned our office space to align with our current working habits. We've adopted a hot-desking system, which required a transition to laptops paired with dual monitors at each desk. While laptops may seem nothing new to most, our teams need powerful workstations and multiple screens for software like Revit. These workstations are now centralized, and everyone connects remotely.?

Each team member now has a small locker for personal items, replacing the traditional under-desk drawers often filled with half-eaten sandwiches, cup-a-soups, and outdated technical information. This change reduces clutter and ensures we always work with up-to-date resources. Everyone also has their wireless keyboard and mouse, which they store in their locker. With hot-desking, all desks are kept clear at the end of the day.

We have expanded our library to centrally store product information and samples, avoiding the common practice among architects of stashing them under their desks.

Interestingly, we anticipated that people would gravitate towards sitting in the same spots or with their teams, but this hasn't been the case. This has led to improved cross-team communication, which is a significant benefit.

In addition to traditional desks, we've introduced standing desks, which have proven very popular. We've also expanded the variety of spaces available to our team, including small two-person rooms, additional meeting rooms, quiet areas, high project tables, and more informal seating arrangements. Larger screens have been installed to facilitate team communication.

None of the studio's meeting rooms can be booked, allowing for informal, spontaneous use. For more formal needs, our traditional meeting rooms are still available. The kitchen has been given greater prominence in the office, and we continue to have daily coffee breaks at 11 a.m. in our atrium café.

We've also created space for design reviews, presentations, and workshops with flexible seating. This area has affectionately become known as "the dancefloor."

As we adjust to the new setup, we've noticed that certain areas, like the standing desks and two-person meeting pods, are popular. On the other hand, the high meeting tables and touchdown areas with stools are not being used as much as we hoped.

It's still early days, and we're figuring out how best to utilise the space. Still, the redesign better aligns with our post-COVID working style, helping with communication and flexibility.