Wide open spaces: cubicle-ridden offices transition to more open-office formats—a result of advanced mobile technology and innovative office design

Journal of Property Management, May-June, 2006 by Diana Mirel

Many of today's office designs and layouts are shifting from a sea of Dilbert-like cubes to open formats, thanks to advances in mobile technology.

"The biggest trend changing the entire work environment is technology--wireless technologies, in particular," said Bob Porter, studio director at Vocon, a commercial design and architecture firm in Cleveland. "This new generation of workers has grown up totally on computers, so they are much more mobile. Therefore, workspaces become more fluid, dynamic and flexible."

Open offices commonly house multifunctional, wireless, shared spaces. They are typically designed with lower-paneled workstations and common rooms, rather than corridors and private offices. They involve modular furniture and, often, more natural light.

While the open-office concept is not new, advanced technology offers more efficiency and inventive functions than ever before. Large public corporations and small private firms alike are clamoring for such spaces, and real estate managers are realizing the advantages of these open layouts.

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THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING OFFICE

Over the last five years, the average office space per employee has shrunk by more than 20 percent, according to surveys conducted by Marcus & Millichap Real Estate Investment Brokerage Co. According to its information, the average rentable square foot per employee is currently estimated at 190 square feet.

However, with alternative work strategies, the average rentable square foot per person might range between 100 and 150 square feet, resulting in savings for tenants, said Dan Cooke, senior vice president of strategic consulting for Jones Lang LaSalle.

Brad Blankenship, vice president of global real estate advisory firm, The Staubach Company, once helped a client save $3.4 million in real estate and operating costs over its 15-year lease term by transitioning from a 100 percent closed, hard-wall office to a 50 percent closed, 50 percent open environment. This savings came from adopting an open design and scaling down 30,000 square feet.

"The two greatest costs of any company are salaries and compensation, and real estate costs," Blankenship said. "If you can reduce your real estate costs, you're reaching into the big numbers."

Eric Beichler, managing partner at Mohr Partners, a corporate real estate services company, said most of Mohr's clients--and the office market in general--have transitioned to a one-third hard-wall and a two-thirds open-office ratio. He said the tremendous movement frequently occurring at corporations, with their hiring spurts and downsizing, spurred the need for flexibility, and in turn, open-office spaces.

"It really changes the whole landscape of how you deal with contraction and growth at companies," Beichler said. "The flexibility gives you a lot more opportunities to make changes internally without having to move."

OPEN OFFICES REPLACE OPEN-DOOR POLICIES

Such a shift in office design stems from vast advances in more compact and mobile technology.

The widespread use of laptop computers, wireless technology and voice communications available over the Internet, referred to as voice-over IP, has increased flexibility and openness in offices. Thus, sharing conference rooms and unassigned workstations is gaining popularity because people can set up virtual offices almost anywhere, Beichler said.

"It becomes much easier for employees to work where they want and still be connected," Cooke, of Jones Lang LaSalle, said. "Technology around data lines has really opened it up for people to work most anywhere."

Open-office workstations are centered on a wired workstation spine--the central axis and chief support of the workstation. Spine connections eliminate the need to provision individual offices, and they can accommodate a variety of easy-to-change workstation setups.

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Marc Margulies, principal of Margulies & Associates, an architecture and interior design firm in Boston, said his office and many offices the company designs have transitioned from having individual walls to having a spine powered with a series of components that can be readily and flexibly arrayed.

"People are trying to move as far away from the rigidity and isolation that goes along with [individual offices] to gain a higher degree of collaboration and flexibility for both work and space purposes," Margulies said. "This more flexible concept really meets those needs."

TECHNOLOGY'S SMALL FOOTPRINT HAS BIG IMPACT

The constantly shrinking nature of computer hardware has also played a major role in open-office design, said Brigitte Preston, design principal at lauckgroup, an interior architecture firm in Texas. She said the proliferation of flat screens has had the biggest impact on workspace size.

The use of flat screen monitors enabled Preston to save space at Green Mountain Energy headquarters in Austin, Texas, by furnishing the area with 120-degree, boomerang-shaped workstations, rather than 90-degree corner units to save space.