Architect 2016-01

major office redesign for the Macquarie
Group, an investment bank, where employees
had previously worked at desks grouped
by department. In the new Sydney headquarters,
there are no assigned workstations and
employees stow their laptops in lockers. Large
staircases cut diagonally through the airy
office, encouraging employees to move
and cross paths with people from different
divisions. The flexible workspaces abolish
what Stanaway describes as “command and
control silos,” where managers separated
employees by department and oversaw them
literally through sight lines.
“It is vital because you need to get
people moving between places and connecting
with others,” Stanaway says. “I think
ultimately connection is always an important
part of any business and if you have a big
business, connection is critical.”
Strip away ingrained expectations and
it becomes clear that sitting in one place
for a certain number of hours each day isn’t
helping—and may actually be hindering—
people from doing their jobs. On the other
hand, when design encourages movement
through the workspace people bump into
each other serendipitously, make connections,
decide to collaborate, and perhaps
even come up with the next big thing. Bright
hallways, coffee bars, and walkways that
cut through the heart of the office are all
spaces that can maximize this “bump.”
That said, empowering people to work
anywhere, anytime can be a challenging
shift for some managers. “You have to
manage people by performance, because if
you try to manage by presence or by visibility,
you will fail,” Stanaway explains. This
can often be a positive transition, because it
encourages managers to set clear expectations
and monitor progress through structured
team meetings.
Not all employees will accept change
willingly, either. Stanaway likes to tell the
story of an employee in a new office who
didn’t like the idea of stowing his things in
a locker. For three months, he refused to
cooperate and would instead overnight mail
his belongings to himself at the end of each
workday.
But ultimately, design can be an effective
tool to change behavior and business culture.
Stanaway worked on an office design for a
company that was trying to become more
people-focused, but the employees described
themselves as “grumpy old men.” The new
office was structured such that nearly everyone
had to walk through a common area
where they would come into contact with
at least ten other employees to get to their
individual workspace. Lockers were also
clustered around a community gathering
point to encourage interaction.
“You would really struggle to go to that
office and not talk to other people,” Stanaway
recalls. “It was about trying to use design to
change the culture.”
Stanaway firmly believes that in order to
best motivate workers, offices must recognize
that diverse people with diverse functions
need diverse spaces in which to work. The
challenge for her, she says, is “the belief that
a homogenous workplace is going to create
a great outcome.”
(left) Macquarie’s offices had previously
grouped its employees by department.
The move to the new space was predicated
by a desire to break down silos
within the organization and promote
a client-based culture.
PORTRAIT ILLUSTRATIONS MICHAEL GILLETTE