The elemental workplace

FANTASTIC IN PRACTICE
What does a fantastic workplace comprise? The proposition is simple, based on an equal consideration of 12 core elements – daylight, connectivity, space, choice, influence, control, refresh, sense, comfort, inclusion, wash and storage. The approach is free of the constraints of sector, location, workstyle or budget – a universally transferable model. Each element still needs a considerable amount of briefing and design to create, and a balance to be arrived at, and the periodic table format allows each organisation to determine the relative importance of each. But there is unlikely to be a fantastic workplace not based on the 12 elements, anywhere.

Yet knowing what we want and why we need it, how do we actually do this? That means the approach, method and mindset, not what it looks like and whether it has a slide. It is all too often that an evaluation of how lurches straight to the aesthetic, and the pictorial nature of much of what we find online rarely helps us extricate ourselves from the shimmer. There is a process based on following a series of design principles, and devising an approach to change focused on the way people are rather than the way you want them to be.

The design principles, like the elements themselves, are transferable – gathering enough evidence while leaving the space to consider opportunity, remaining beta-minded (as we have explored here), being thorough with the development of a sound brief, keeping our language, intent and ideas simple, staying focused on people, staying relevant (and thus avoiding fads), keeping everything in balance and sweating the small stuff.

While the potential of the workplace to positively benefit individuals and organisations is huge, a fantastic workplace alone won’t fix a rotten culture. Yet handling a cultural challenge is nowhere near as complex as the snake-oil peddlers would have it. There are five simple cultural contributions that go a long way towards creating a positive and beneficial working environment.

The first is to talk to people like adults – essentially because they are adults. Simple language, regular dialogue, clear explanation, a why/how/what framework, pre-empting questions that will be asked in response, and a format for enabling two-way dialogue all go towards comprising adultspeak. It doesn’t have to be perfect – in fact, it’s better when not. We can get this wrong at both ends of the spectrum, through over-formalised ‘corporate comms’ or, at the other extreme, hipsterglyphics.

Second, allow people to adapt rather than forcing them to adopt a new behaviour at a given time. It is the fundamental error with workplace change management. Let people take the time they need to decide the change is right for them and what it means for them. So many workplace change programmes try to force adoption, and in so doing become fixated on the resistors. This is particularly so when transitioning to an agile workplace, with probably the worst, most soul-destroying examples resulting in the insanity of ‘enforced agile’.

Third, trust people to work when, where and how they choose. They will need the space, the portable technology and, most of all, the permission to exercise this choice, but will respond to being trusted with trust of the organisation and its leadership. Trust is infectious.

Fourth, model the behaviour you want to see – and ensure this happens from the very top of the organisation. Leaders will be watched far more than they are listened to. In making a commitment to change, leaders need to ask their teams to hold them to it, as this is another way to create a bond of trust.

BE EXCELLENT
Finally, embrace the Bill and Ted approach from their 1989 film – “be excellent to each other”. If we treat each other respectfully and considerately, much of what has been described in the first four considerations will happen naturally. You can choose to do this; it is an attitude, it is in your hands. All five cultural contributors are examples of good neighbourliness. Embedding this removes the need to be instructive and prescriptive with protocols and etiquette. There is no need for this if people are allowed the time to understand why change can be positive for them, so that they decide to change. What a relief.

The drive behind the creation of the elemental workplace is a belief that everyone deserves a fantastic workplace – that it is the right thing to do, that it is attainable, and that it is simple if we focus on the right things. We have talked about it for long enough. There are no more excuses; it’s time to get on with it.