CMI Workplace

Top 6 Office Design Trends for 2011

stevencrabbe — Wed, 05 Jan 2011 15:11:33 +0000

Beware - small desk!

Prediction No 1

Desk sizes can only shrink so far….

Trying to squeeze more people into the same space will ultimatly result in the loss of productivity. Better to look closely at the occupation levels and nature of the tasks being performed and use this as a basis for allocating space

I can hear you!

Prediction No 2

Increasing demand for meeting rooms with high standard of acoustic control…..

Conference calls have been a routine feature of office life for some years, but the amplified human voice can prove hard to control in modern buildings designed for 100% open plan(i.e. cheaper to build)

The biggest problem is controlling transmition of sound above the ceiling and below the floor. Achieving a technical target will not always match a clients expectations that his conversations will not be heard outside the room

Who am I working for?

Prediction No 3

Increasing emphasis on aligning the look and feel of a working environment with Brand Image & Organisational Values

With so many changes to organisational structures during 2010, clients are looking to reinforce their brand and organisation’s values within the working environment. Usually to either underline a recent change, or to send a message to employees, to say how important they are in continuing to maintain the organisatuion’s success.

Keeping that call 1 to 1

Predication No 4

Making confidential calls in the open office is getting harder to do

We all know this familair situation. You want to make that all important sales call in private, but where to go in an open plan office full of people?

To address this need, we have noted a growing number of products such as wall mounted phone booths that can be blended ino the office layout to provide a higher degree of privacy without the high cost of building sound proof rooms.

Predication No 5

Developments in technology continue to impact on workplace design….

Not withstanding the use of ipads to control room booking sytems or change light levels, simple things such as the increasing use of laptops to replace fixed PCs. How should this increased flexibility of where to work be harnessed to improve efficiency and liberate the office design? Ergonomic good practice and compliance with legislation must be taken into account. For example providing larger monitor screens for those who spend an extended amount of time on the computer.

We are seeing some interesting new products from office furniture manufacturers responding to opportunities offered by advancing technology. The most prominent of these are collaboration spaces, centred on large high definition screen(s) which enables users to connect and share their laptops. The large screens also allow remote user participation.

Predication No 6

LED light fittings will be seen in more & more general working environments…..

Small, thin but powerfull, LED lamps are highly energy efficient, have incredibly long lamp life with negligiable heat output.

Within offices, they are currently used mainly as feature light sources, but expect to see them used for general lighting of workspaces very soon.

As designers, we love the fact that the fittings, can be very discrete to blend into the overall design so that you see the light not the fitting.

We hope you have found this blog usefull and thought provoking. Please do leave a comment or get in contact if you would like advice on any of the items we have adddressed. What are your predictions for 2011 & beyond?

Successful Flexible Working Environments 2010 Seminar

stevencrabbe — Wed, 15 Dec 2010 17:32:06 +0000

We are very pleased that we decided to sponsor this event, which took place a few weeks ago in London. Many thanks in particluar to our client Ed Large of Vodafone PropertyGroup for being our guest speaker this year. His role at Vodafone, takes him to many different parts of the world, giving him a global insight into the practical and cultural diferences in working environments.

Ed’s session was followed by contibutions from Bob Crichton of HOP Associates, Bridget Taylor of Customer Service Direct, Tim Dwelly of Workhubs and Paul Pickover,who recently led a large project implementing flexible working for the Home Office.

In summary, those who attended were able to benefit from the wide range of experience relayed by the speakers and indeed, fellow delegates, each with their own unique experience to bring to the table.

Now looking forward to next year’s event!

Many thanks to Andy Lake for making it all happen!

CMI Wokplace are sponsoring Flexible Working Environments 2010

stevencrabbe — Fri, 24 Sep 2010 10:54:03 +0000

CMI Workplace are proud to be Main Sponsors of Flexible Working Environments 2010 2nd November 2010 in London

This high profile seminar is organised by Flexibility.co.uk, Europe’s leading online journal for new ways of working. It takes a highly practical approach, showcasing examples of different approaches from organisations and providing leading edge ideas and practice

For more information click on http://www.totalsmartworking.com/.

How Much Office Space? – A Recent Example

stevencrabbe — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 11:35:22 +0000

A common problem at the early stage of a project involving a new building or moving to different premises, is to establish how much space is required by the organisation? Clients are reluctant to engage at an early stage because of confidentaility issues or raising expectations which may not be met. Also the end users will not have the experience or knowledge of how to calculate the office space – why would they? This is where the “allow 10 square metres per person” rule frequently appears as a catch all number, to size the amount of space required. The resulting volume of space will often be larger than really needed and with construction and running costs going forward.

How to successfully overcome this issue? Recently we were able to recommnd reducing a 3,840square metre building footprint by 449 square metres (Net Internal Area), equivelent to 10% of the internal space, following a sequence of rapid briefings, test fit space planning and interaction with the business unit that will occupy the space. This has been achieved without any desk sharing or other smart working methods being introduced.

Some Do’s & Don’ts When Considering The Amount of Office Space You Need

Consider introducing ’smart working’ (desk sharing) to save space AND improve productivity
Review the volume of filing and methodolgy for archiving
Make sure you allow enough space for meetings – this is one of the most common areas where clients underestimate demand.
Provide enough smaller rooms where end users can make confidential calls or have one to one meetings.

Don’t

Let your existing furniture footprint dictate the ’space planning’ - the savings that can be achieved by using less space will far exceed the cost of new workstations.
Forget to consider space for activities such as tele-conferencing or personal video calling (e.g. Skype) which are increasingly being introduced to the workplace.
Miss including the space requirments for your IT infrastructure from day one - we have seen many comms rooms increase in size after building/ amount of space has been fixed.
Loose sight of the fact that if there is a point at which reducing space will become counter productive – for example noise levels causing distraction.

Further Advice

If you would like specific advice on office sizing issues, please feel free to contact us via our website: WWW.cmiworkplace.co.uk

Flexible Spaces 2010: Smart Working Environments

stevencrabbe — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 14:39:43 +0000

We are delighted to be sponsoring this event which takes place at the Royal Society of Arts on the 6th October this year which is being organised by Flexibility.co.uk.

The key topics covered will be:

Share best practice in new ways of working
Focus on property efficiency benefits – cost savings, optimising use of property and facilities, ‘spaceless growth’
Developing effective collaborative working environments
Special strand for the government workplace
Practical approach: how to do it, tools and techniques, metrics
Make new contacts amongst people interested in rolling out flexible working solutions

Who Should Attend: Senior decsion makers in the commercial and not for profit sectors, especialy from Strategy, Property, Assett Management, Finance, HR, Facilities, and Managers charged with developing flexible working projects in their organisations.

If you are interested in attending or would like to know more please contact steven.crabbe@cmiworkplace.co.uk

Recently Completed Project – Vodafone Stoke on Trent

admin — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 09:41:55 +0000

I am very proud of our design work on this project which completed a couple of months ago. To start with the building design, led by Alan McBeth for RPS Architects (photographed by Edmund Sumner) is both imaginative and innovative, so we were off to a good start.

This shot from the first floor shows our design for the call halls with central pit stop/ training pod. There are about 1000 peole working out of the space, the majority of whom are custmer service related. You can how natural light is coming in via the roof lights which is augmented by “theatre style” lighting gantrys. Not only does this create a better working environment, but saves energy too.

We introduced key features like these entrance portals to give a sense of arrival & make the most of the big volume space. A lot of detail design develpment went into these, particularly to get the lightbox colours to comply with Vodafone’s branding requirements.

The workstations are a simple rectangle, but set out on the floor to radiate from the central pit stops. This has allowed us to provide plenty of desktop space for each agent but also conform to our clients global space standards.

This photo. taken a couple of days after move in shows how quickly the end users have settled into their new home.

A key benefit for staff is the full service “Mezz” restaurant centred on the first floor between the two call halls

The Vodafone end users have responded very positivly to their new working environment which we belive to be one be one of the most innovative contact centre environments completed recently in the UK. The scheme has been enterd for a British Offices Regional award, so.we are keeping our fingers crossed!

See our website www.cmiworkplace.co.uk to view other recent projects & more.

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admin — Sat, 10 Apr 2010 23:33:01 +0000

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