Workplace Collaborative Space Layout Typology and Occupant Perception of Collaboration Environment

The value of effective collaboration has become increasingly critical for organizational performance and agility. Along with technical and managerial strategies, the workspace spatial environment needs to be recognized and studied for its impact on collaboration and interactive behavior at work. Most spatial parameters studied in the workplace research literature are workstation-scale characteristics. However, these may not sufficiently describe the variety of shared spaces in which collaborative work and interactions take place. Based on a two-year multiple-site field study of workplace settings, this paper explores the space typology of a wide spectrum of formal and informal collaborative spaces, and it introduces a new set of layout-scale quantitative indices to describe the amount and distribution of collaborative spaces in a workplace. This research tested layout-scale spatial variables and compared them with workstation-scale variables in order to determine how well these variables predict the occupants' perception of the support from their workplace spatial environment for collaborative work and the distractions from others' interactive behavior in the work environment. The design implications of the findings are explored, and future research directions are identified.

[1]  Theresa J. B. Kline,et al.  Traditional versus Open Office Design , 2002 .

[2]  Robert E. Kraut,et al.  --Understanding Effects of Proximity on Collaboration : Implications for Technologies to Support Remote Collaborative Work , 2001 .

[3]  Mary Jo Hatch,et al.  Physical Barriers, Task Characteristics, and Interaction Activity in Research and Development Firms , 1987 .

[4]  Michael L. Tushman,et al.  Competing by design: the power of organizational architecture , 1998 .

[5]  Daniel J. Brass,et al.  Employee Reactions to an Open-Plan Office: A Naturally Occurring Quasi-Experiment. , 1979 .

[6]  E. Sundstrom,et al.  Privacy at Work: Architectural Correlates of Job Satisfaction and Job Performance , 1980 .

[7]  Yitzhak Fried,et al.  Employee reactions to workspace characteristics. , 1987 .

[8]  Peter E.D. Love,et al.  The impact of work settings on organisational performance measures in built facilities , 2002 .

[9]  G. R. Oldham,et al.  Relationships between Office Characteristics and Employee Reactions: A Study of the Physical Environment. , 1983 .

[10]  D. Watson,et al.  Beyond negative affectivity: Measuring stress and satisfaction in the workplace. , 1987 .

[11]  Cary L. Cooper,et al.  Occupational differences in the work–strain relationship: Towards the use of situation-specific models. , 1999 .

[12]  Edwin M. Bartee,et al.  Organizational Development: Theory, Practice, and Research , 1979 .

[13]  Peter J. Robertson,et al.  Organizational development: Theory, practice, and research. , 1992 .

[14]  Pascale Carayon,et al.  The Relationship between Privacy, Control, and Stress Responses in Office Workers , 1993 .

[15]  Goksenin Inalhan,et al.  Disproving Widespread Myths about Workplace Design , 2003 .

[16]  Robert E. Kraut,et al.  Coordination in Large Scale Software Development , 1990 .

[17]  Larry P. Ritzman,et al.  Merging prescriptive and behavioral approaches for office layout , 1981 .

[18]  Greg R. Oldham,et al.  Effects of changes in workspace partitions and spatial density on employee reactions: A quasi-experiment. , 1988 .

[19]  William M. Pugh,et al.  Spatial and Perceptual Components of Crowding , 1975 .

[20]  T. Davenport.  Thinking for a living : how to get better performance and results from knowledge workers , 2005 .

[21]  R Matela,et al.  Graph-Theoretic Aspects of Polyominoes and Related Spatial Structures , 1976 .

[22]  Franklin Becker,et al.  Offices at Work: Uncommon Workspace Strategies that Add Value and Improve Performance , 2004 .

[23]  T. Allen.  Managing the flow of technology , 1977 .

[24]  John T. Gullahorn,et al.  Distance and Friendship as Factors in the Gross Interaction Matrix , 1952 .

[25]  Jennifer A. Veitch,et al.  Environmental Satisfaction in Open-Plan Environments : 2 . Effects of Workstation Size , Partition Height and Windows , 2002 .

[26]  ed. Duffy,et al.  The Changing Workplace , 1991 .

[27]  R Matela,et al.  Distance Measures over Polyomino Populations , 1976 .

[28]  Carl Gutwin,et al.  A Descriptive Framework of Workspace Awareness for Real-Time Groupware , 2002, Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW).

[29]  John Worthington,et al.  Reinventing the Workplace , 1997 .

[30]  Greg R. Oldham,et al.  Employee affective and behavioral reactions to the spatial density of physical work environments , 2005 .

[31]  J. Desor,et al.  Toward a Psychological Theory of Crowding. , 1972 .

[32]  Carol T. Kulik,et al.  Physical Environments and Employee Reactions: Effects of Stimulus-Screening Skills and Job Complexity , 1991 .

[33]  Kevin M. Powell,et al.  Collaborative knowledge work environments , 2004 .

[34]  Richard V. Farace,et al.  Traditional versus open offices: A comparison of sociotechnical, social relations, and symbolic meaning perspectives. , 1987 .

[35]  Robert E. Kraut,et al.  Coordination in software development , 1995, CACM.

[36]  Yitzhak Fried,et al.  Exploring the relationship between workspace density and employee attitudinal reactions: An integrative model , 2001 .