Placing a name on something brings more meaning to it.  A name describes an object of interest, providing additional insight into what the object is.  For example, think about the sky.  The sky is a big entity that we can all associate with.  But give the sky a “name”, and a different understanding is gained:  blue sky, stormy sky, angry sky, sun-set sky.  Each name fills out of different image in our mind of the nature of the sky.

Finding an all-inclusive name for work has been a broad search in recent years.  We in workplace strategy have been seeking the right name to describe the evolving world of work we are living in today?   I turned to Google’s search engine to collect some data on today’s more common work names.

“Knowledge Work”:  1,880,000 results

Peter Drucker created the name knowledge work in 1959 to describe work based on using information to develop knowledge to gain results.  This name differentiated work that was primarily focused on products and goods.  The PBS study “The First Measured Century” stated that knowledge work (tertiary occupations) began at 21% of the male workforce (sorry females!) in 1900 and ended at 58% in 1998.  In 1900 20% of women held professional work.  In 1998 52% of women held professional work.

“Telework”:  1,660,000 results

According to Merriam Webster’s, an associated name to telework, “telecommute”, was first used in 1974.  In using the connector “tele”, the name pays tribute to the most commonly owned technology of the 1970’s – the television.  The television was a device designed to transmit vision over huge distances.  Telework, then, is work that happens over distance.  In 2010, the president signed The Telework Enhancement Act, which was intended to enable government workers to engage in more work at a distance, thus reducing costs.

“Smart Work”:  1,620,000 results

Smart work often is described as work to make ideas happen.  Scott Belsky writes in his “WorkSmart” blog in Fast Company that, “The greatest achievements happen in the overlap of three things: Your genuine interests, skills, and opportunities. To find success, work within your overlap.”

“Mobile Work”:  1,350,000 results

Mobile work has one core principle:  work results are not dependent on a single place.  The impact of mobile work on the workplace has been most dramatic in the past ten years.  Some estimates are currently quoting that there are 1 billion mobile workers in the world today.  We consistently see utilization measurements averaging as low as 35% in workplaces today.

“Alternative Work”:  668,000 results

Alternative work is most often used to describe protocols for work under variable schedules.  The U.S. Office of Personnel Management has published an on-line Handbook of Alternative Work Schedules.

“Distributed Work”:  477,000 results

In the 2002 book titled “Distributed Work” published by The MIT Press, the authors expanded the definition of telework to include the attributes of smart work.  The combination of diverse locations and a concentration on idea generation within distributed work is uniquely dependent of the use of technology. 

“Flexible Work”:  4,340,000 results

Of all the names for work, the name that leads them all is Flexible Work.  Such phrases as “work & life balance”, autonomy of choice, engagement & worker satisfaction, and overtime regulation are within the meaning of the name flexible work.  Of all the names given to the nature or work today, the name Flexible Work stirs that most change reaction.  A 2011 Fortune article states once again the challenges from the perceived losses of face time and visible long hours in the office resulting from Flexible Work. 

Workplace strategy has not condensed the nomenclature around a common name for work.  As companies of all types and sizes continue to develop their own uniquely branded names for the work that is actually occurring within their footprints, more names will surely be created.  There may be as many names for work as there are companies in the world. 

My opinion is that “Flexible work” is the best of the bunch, as it is the most encompassing of the basic migration of behaviors of work process.  And flexible OR agile space design is a good general term for workplaces that meet the evolving work processes and cultural needs of all companies at work.

I do not like “alternative work”, “tele-work”, “smart work”.  Each of these implies that there is an opposite version of work, which creates conflict.  It is a continuing debate with no clear end in sight.

Tags: Change, Communication, Learning, Lesson
Posted in Agility, Architecture, Futuristic, Innovative, Mobility, Trends, Workplace

I recently had the pleasure of attending a two day Lessons Learned Workshop at NIH related to Biomedical Research Facilities that have been built in the last several years. In today’s complex world we architects are trying, harder than ever it seems, to meet the needs of our client with each project, but today, our clients seem to have many voices. The beauty of this conference was that all of the competing voices were in one place and had a chance to express their perspective in an educational setting. In the project world it can be an extremely delicate balancing act to place the proper emphasis on the right voice.

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Tags: Advice, Behavior, Biocontainment, Change, Collaboration, Labs, Leadership, Learning, NIH, pain, Programming, Research, Safety, Strategy
Posted in Agility, Architecture, Change Management, Design, Generations, Innovative, Lab Planning, People, Science

While doing research for a presentation entitled “Learning Spaces for the Future”, I came across the e-Book “Learning Spaces”, published through Educause. The book came up recently in conversation and I was reminded of what a great source of information it is. The book is organized into two parts; part one, “Principles and Practices”, contains a series of articles on learning space design. Part two contains case studies where innovative approaches were taken to create highly successful learning environments. “Learning Spaces” is a truly inspirational resource for taking alternative approaches to traditional classroom design.

The link is as follows: http://www.educause.edu/LearningSpaces

Tags: Books, Learning, students
Posted in Architecture, Classrooms, Futuristic, Higher Education, People

In the middle of 2010, Keith Perske posted a compelling blog challenging the design field to think about work without our typical reliance on thinking about place.  I say, “AMEN”.

As an architect deeply concerned about the nature of work, I see places continually being created that are disconnected from the reality of what it now means to be “people” at work.  We have limited our thinking of “place” to the physical, and have not touched on the emotional, psychological, and inter-relationship that drive people to produce results in the context of their work.  Place is a subset of work, along with the parameters of technology, process, brand, economics, etc.  In combination, these parameters create demands of place that are simultaneously physical and virtual, but equal in social dynamics.

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Tags: Behavior, Change, Experience
Posted in Agility, Architecture, Mobility, People, Workplace

If you’ve been to a seminar on sustainable practices lately, you may have heard the popular concept that tunneling through cost barriers might provide better spaces for people. To my knowledge, the concept was popularized by Paul Hawkins, Amory Lovins, and L. Hunter Lovins in their book, Natural Capitalism, more than 10 years ago.

Graph from 'Natural Capitalism' by Paul Hawkins, Amory Lovins, and L. Hunter Lovins

So what does it mean? The simplest example that is often given is that of a residential house: you can buy better windows, more efficient insulation, and even take advantage of passive solar heating. With all of these improvements, you will eventually reach the point of diminishing returns when you are spending extra money to save energy on heating your home. The detour that now seems possible is that you can reach a point where you’ve so radically reduced the heating load that you can eliminate the furnace and its associated ductwork altogether.

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Tags: Change, Renovation
Posted in Architecture, LEED, Science, Sustainability, Technology, Technology/Innovation

We architects often have difficulty communicating with non-architects.  We seemed to have developed a language that only works among ourselves.  If we’d just let the rest of you in on the game I think we’d produce much better results.  I was recently in a meeting half-way around the world in Dhaka, Bangladesh where this idea was underscored for me.

This was a conference room full of engineers and business people, or so I thought.  The meeting was being conducted in English, but it was not the natural language for most of the people in the room.  I had become very animated in describing the (5) essential elements of the Parti (architecture speak for “the big idea”) when one person, who had previously been fairly quiet, stepped forward and made it clear he wanted to debate.  The very next thing he did was turn to the rest of the room and said:  “you guys just won’t understand”.  He proceeded to quiz me on the validity of my argument about the relationship of the essential elements of the plan in a manner that I could easily understand, but didn’t make a lot of sense to the rest of the room.  It turns out this guy was a construction manager educated in an American school of architecture.

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Posted in Architecture, People

I spoke to an engineer the other day who was involved in the design of a manufacturing cleanroom for a materials science application.  This project required extremely low temperature and humidity conditions.  My first question was:  “Do people have to work in those spaces?”

He said:  “Yes and with special gowning they can survive in this harsh environment.”

I immediately thought of a conversation with a BioPharma engineer.  He said:  “We’ve spent the last 25 years trying to design people out of the manufacturing process.”  The prevailing thinking in the BioPharma industry was that people are unpredictable and have idiosyncratic needs that make them burdensome in cGMP spaces.  With the future of the BioPharma industry being focused more on low-volume, high turn-over personalized medicines, the prevailing logic around people in (or not) the manufacturing process may have gone too far.  Empowered and knowledgeable workers making real-time decisions may be the key to the TQM process, efficient change-overs and their future competitive advantage.

Perhaps there are lessons to be learned from the BioPharma industry that can be applied to Materials Science.   The issue is not how people can survive in the environment, rather we should be thinking about the next generation of employees and how they can actually thrive in these highly specialized environments.

Tags: Labs
Posted in Architecture, Design, Lab Planning, People

Growing up in a house with a research chemist and designing laboratories for the last 15 years I have observed firsthand that  we share many similarities in what we do and our process.    I guess that my initial predisposition to the above hypothesis starts with a belief that architecture is the marriage between artistry and science.  Architects are trained to manipulate and coordinate materials and technology to creatively design space that is informed by people.  Scientists are trained to symmetrically study and acquire knowledge which leads to solving a problem.

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Tags: LinkedIn
Posted in Architecture, Lab Planning, People, Science

Understanding People and Process Resulting in Design of Place

Over the next few blog entries, Brady will be discussing how individuals interact with others and their environment at work and how this affects the planning behind design of space.

How do we choose a place to work?  What drives us to join and stay with a company?  It is a complex answer that stems from functional, emotional, physical and social aspects of being a human being at work.  The balance needed to maintain a positive value proposition between an individual and an organization is in constant flux.  Likely the most complex issue that a company should be concerned about is the social dynamics of the work created. 

The science of social dynamics is the study of the ability of a group of people who are in relation with each other to react to inner and outer changes.  This mathematically inspired approach to people comprises an analysis of the group’s ability to deal with its regulation mechanisms.  Workplace design builds upon the systems, sociology and individual behaviors of the group in order to shape space to affect positive results in the dynamics of the group.

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Tags: Behavior, Experience, Interior, Strategy
Posted in Architecture, Design, People, Workplace

I last wrote about the perception of community colleges and the opportunities to not only change that perception but to effectively change the reality. Another common theme I heard when meeting with the many community colleges was strategic partnerships

Strategic Partnerships: The question of future funding from the state for community colleges is a cause for great concern; “it’s not whether the cut from the state will or won’t take place, it’s how deep will it be and how will we deal with it.” How then will community colleges meet the needs of a growing student body with shrinking state dollars?

With state funding in doubt and pressure to keep tuition costs competitive, partnerships with private industry within the community along with philanthropic support is seen as the way of the future. 

At the White House Community College Summit, held on October 5, 2010, private corporations were strongly encouraged to partner with community colleges with the goal of graduating an additional 5,000,000 people to enter the workforce by 2020. That same day, a $35,000,000 grant by the Gates Foundation, targeting Ohio as one of the nine states, to improve the graduation rate at community colleges was established.

Tags: Budget, Campus, college, partnerships, students
Posted in Architecture, Campus Planning, Classrooms, Higher Education, People