The evolution of the collaborative work environment - Part 1.
This is SO "me". I finally think of something to blog, and it turns out to be a zillion-page novel. *sigh*. For those who bother, bear with me ... it could get interesting! .. This is part 1.Over the last many months, the company I work for has been developing a new concept for the work environment. The concept is called "Det Levende Hus" (danish for "The Living House") and is meant to be more than just a change in the physical officespace, not just a changing arkitechture, but changing work culture, philosophy, organisation, competency, identity, technology, innovation and collaboration.
My first day in this new work environment was this monday, dec. 14th.
We're an insurance company. Yeah, yeah, I know ... right know you're all thinking "oh, my - I wish I was in insurance, it's soooo sexy", but you shouldn't worry. We struggle with the same challenges as less sexy industries: Brand management, Combined Ratios, Generation Y replacing Baby Boomers ... the list goes on. On top of that, we're in an industry, that has a fairly abstract product portfolio, that we need to keep relevant for a customer base that is evolving at the proverbial speed of thought.
Traditionally, we have been an organisation of small, closed offices with 2,maybe 4, employees in each office, and managers on all levels, safely sheltered from the storm in each their own little office. In some parts of the organisations, i.e. call centers, IT-development and the like, larger, open officespace has been the norm for some time, but while it hasn't been cubicles, employees have had a tendency to "box themselves in", using shelves and noticeboards to build small confined areas resembling traditional offices.
Strangely enough (Doh!), such reclusive behavior is not beneficial for collaboration, does not help you share your knowledge, and for sure does not inspire innovation. In other words, it does very little to help the grey-suited, dusty insurance industry maximize its potentential.
Change was needed, and thus change was planned. Change, as such, can be many things. But change as fundamental as this, is in any case very expensive. So if you really want to make changes on this scale, you might as well go all-in, which was what our management concluded too. So they built a temporary officebuilding from what looked like shipping containers - prefabricated elements snapped together like Legotm - and moved a boatload of people into the (admittedly well equipped) containers, while Bob the Builder and his happy gang of handymen took a sledgehammer to the building the deported employees used to occupy.
Care had been given to the scope of the project. A vision had been formed, and with it a description of purpose and a mission, with targets to achieve
The new physical environment is created in a visual style that is intended to appeal to innovative thinking. From an architectural point, it is inspired by the organic structure of trees, the hallways being the trunk and the different "spaces" (offices, meeting areas etc), the branches leading to the fruits, which is supposedly our personal workspaces.
Do you ever get that feeling, that philosophy is all good and well, but things can get SO philisophical, that it disconnects from reality and become impossible and irrelevant? I fear that the above is such a thing, but perhaps the philosphy in details is not all that important. What is important is, that the physical environment is one of movement, dynamics, energy, possibilities, instead of one of reclusiveness, quiet, static traditions and laissez faire!
The is no laissez faire in "The Living House". None, Zero, Zip, Nada, Nichts. The way we used to work has been ripped up at the roots and replanted in a different universe. We must un-learn what we have learned (to quote Master Yoda), and learn to thrive under new norms and cultures.
So this is what our office looks like now. Open spaces with blocks of 4 desks and 12-16 desks in all in every workspace. In itself, no revolution, but there is more!
This concludes part 1.
In part 2, I'll show more of the elements surrounding these workspaces.
Part 3, will talk about ways to support the new ways of collaborating with new technology platforms.
Collaboration Det Levende Hus Domino Notes Quickr. Sametime The living house Workspace 
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December 17th, 2009