The Efficiency of Future Workspaces
Automation began as an idea to assist human workers to process information and produce results more efficiently. However, it has now grown into a specter that takes the job of many blue-collar workers. Rather than appreciating it as an important milestone in work development, we now frame ‘robots’ as an issue in the discourse of the future of our workspace.
It’s true that computers have made many jobs obsolete, especially those which involve processing. It’s only a matter of time before automation takes over sophisticated activities even in white-collar jobs.
However, the future of the workspace is going to focus less on the automation of work, but how efficiently its human component work.
The Possible outlines that the office of today is “factory for ‘knowledge work’.” These knowledge workers are people who work to solve problems creatively, and their main goal is to produce and develop new ideas and resources.
Because of that, office spaces of today are less concerned with the tools of the trade of its employees – all of them are available in two handy gadgets: their laptops and smartphones. In fact, 53% of workers prefer to use their own devices, according to a CoreNet Global study.
Moreover, the companies of today are less dense. A platform that manages some millions of users is staffed by 200 team members. The rest is outsourced. Businesses have their operations transformed by the ease of access to digital talent platforms.
Cheap and efficient workspaces, however, are two different things.
Cheap workspaces focus on using as little footprint for as much result as possible. This means cramping employees down on small spaces and providing next to none alternative to working in a closed space. These offices often opt to let go of facultative parts of the office to press costs. This, in turn, can lead to a decrease in employee satisfaction.
A study by Fidelity Investments found that 58% of millennial employees would choose a better quality of life at the office over a higher salary. Companies that overlook elective perks and benefits could risk losing the leading minds of today’s workforce.
An efficient workspace, on the other hand, will maximize the use of every square meter of the office space. Efficient workspaces are human-centric. The optimization of employee experience means that these companies work more toward “lifetime employability instead of lifetime employment,” says William Kerr, a professor at Harvard Business School. Efficient companies maximize touchpoints between the workspace and the employee to increase productivity.
These companies strive to make the best use of their employees’ 8-hours workday. They are obsessed with reducing the time spent in meetings by ‘hacking’ their meeting rooms using state-of-the-art technology and inspiring design. Efficient CEOs are driven to flip the extra space in their offices to nap rooms or yoga studios.
Efficient companies make decisions based on their employees’ wellbeing and productivity, not cost.
The ubiquity of IoT devices and cloud computing means that there are now even fewer reasons why employees need to physically all be in one space. Office layouts now prioritize rooms for collaboration and other team-based activities, such as open lounges and shared workspaces.
In fact, the very same technology no longer requires teams to be in one location at all. Remote teams in satellite offices can work as efficiently as a large team in a central headquarters. These ‘networked offices’ can serve as the solutions to the fragmenting of Central Business District.
If you’re looking to base your growing company in an office space that’s designed to inspire and encourage collaboration, then GoWork may provide you with the smart workspace that you need. Moreover, with 20+ locations across Indonesia, your team could just about literally take their work anywhere.
With our all-inclusive access, manage your teams in multiple satellite offices, without any additional costs. Stop running an office, and start managing your team at GoWork’s coworking and flexible office solutions.