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Crafting enjoyable office design is fundamental for success. Ensuring your office fit-out includes staff well-being as a design factor will increase staff retention, lower sickness and cultivate a friendly office community.
Businesses often undervalue happiness as a design and build feature. A survey conducted by Gusto records that 54% of employees state a strong sense of community has kept them at company longer. This underlines the importance of creating a happy workplace.
But there are greater advantages to cultivating a joyful workplace that often go unstated. Creating a happy working environment will also inspire your people to greater levels of performance, promote wellbeing and incentivise them to investing into a corporate community.
Discover how to motivate your staff by creating a happy workspace.
Sunny Office Builds
Natural light has a profound impact on creating enjoyable workspaces that motivate people. This is due to the way that light interacts with the human body.
Light is responsible for regulating the human body clock. The first burst of light in the morning sends signals to the body that it is time to get up and start working. Working in poorly lit spaces can affect the body clock, leaving employees tired or creating disruptions in their nightly sleeping patterns. This will affect office morale as people will be more lethargic and grumpier.
Light also makes people more alert. It acts like a natural jolt of coffee. Increasing the amount of light will make your employees perkier and happier.
Research has found that 47% of employees feel tired at work and 43% feel gloomy due to the lack of natural light. Meaning there are numerous office design and builds that need an office redesign to increase light.
When designing an office, we advise creating spaces with large windows to allow natural light into the space. Where this isn’t possible, look for lighting solutions that will replicate a natural light source. This will energise your staff and boost productivity.
Community Driven Office Designs
Office designs that create inclusive and collaborative spaces provide a motivating environment your people will love. As we are social creatures, and nobody likes being alone.
Employees are 17% more satisfied with their job when working in a collaborative environment.
Research by Salesforce indicates that 86% of workers identify ineffective cooperation as a major cause of failure in business. One of the prominent causes of this failure was office designs that created hostile or negative experiences through communication.
Create spaces where there are no physical barriers to communication between team members to foster co-operation. Plan offices so desks are clustered together in a way that encourages communication. Large communal break spaces are also a great way to promote a sense of community in office design.
It is also recommended to design workspaces make remote workers feel included in the physical space. Fostering their sense of belonging will increase their happiness.
Include plants and greenery in office fit-outs
Incorporating plants into interior office design is a great way to create a happy working environment.
A study conducted by the University of Technology Sydney discovered incorporating plants into an office will:
- Reduce anxiety by 37%
- Reduce office hostility by 44%
- Reduce chronic fatigue by 40%
- Reduce depression by 50%
Office design and build that incorporate plants will create a happier workplace because they combat mental illness and reduce stress.
Exeter University has also noted a 15% increase in productivity when plants are introduced into the office. The increase in productivity is due to the psychological effects of being in a greener workspace. Humans feel happier around plants as it the environment we evolved in.
They also have the added benefit of increasing the air quality of an office.
So, incorporating a potted plant or two into your office design will create a workspace where people feel at ease, increase production, and reduce illness.
Promote Activity in Office Design
Consider office designs to promote exercise and activity. This increases motivation and happiness in employees.
Research by the American Psychological Association reports the 53% of adults feel good about themselves after exercise and 30% feel less stressed. So, by making exercise more accessible to employees you can create a more positive working environment.
When designing an office look to include features like a shower space so people can cycle or run to work. As well as changing rooms and locker spaces so employees can attend an exercise class at lunch or on-site gyms.
Including open spaces where employees can get together and create their own fun activities is also a great way to bolster teamwork.
Including these features in your office will not only encourage employees to work-out together or attend exercise classes as a team but also increase the health of your workforce lowering sickness.
Create communal breakout spaces
Relaxing break areas are a key in creating happy offices.
A workplace study conducted by Staples found that encouraging employees to take breaks not only increased happiness by 59% but also increased employee health by eliminating office burnout and stress.
The added advantages of creating break-out areas where employees can unwind and destress comes from creating communal space where people from different teams can interact with each other. This creates a friendly culture while boosting inter-team cooperation.
Creating community driven spaces is essential for cultivating a positive working culture. And keeping employees fresh and energised.
Stimulating Artwork during Office Design
Be sure to incorporate artwork into your office fit-out.
Artwork lowers stress, increases productive and gives workers the feeling of being valued.
Research shows that looking at art stimulates our brains in positive ways and is often as stimulating as looking at someone you love. For this reason, choosing inspiring pieces of art during an office fit-out is essential for creating a joyful workspace that will motivate your staff.
Designing offices for happiness is a great way to boost motivation. Enjoyable workspaces boost performance, lower sickness, and create a collaborative environment where business thrives. By incorporating these simple tricks into an office design and build you can cultivate an atmosphere to propel your business to new heights of growth and performance.
Design an enjoyable office environment that grows your business with Officeinsight. Let’s chat.
