“Good design is good business,” Thomas J. Watson famously declared in the early 70s. But while the link between design and performance has since been well established with products, only recently has the physical workplace environment garnered the same attention.
As workplace experts (not to mention people who work in offices), we understand the impact design has on how work is done: how productive we are and—as crucially—how engaged we are in it. We have been preaching “good design matters” for a long time, demonstrating the connection between the physical environment and employee satisfaction, individual and team performance, and an evolving organizational culture. Heads nod, but we are also met with raised eyebrows asking, “How do you know?”