After 25 years of global occupier side experience, the conclusion is... creating a fantastic workplace is simple.
That is, despite the complex forces at play and the constant pressure on organisations to do more with less, the delicate task of considering and balancing increasing numbers of competing internal and external interests, and the constant challenge to do something different with a filament lightbulb. Plus the realisation that it actually has nothing whatsoever to do with the war for talent, an era of unprecedented change, the unchecked rise of wilful job-eradicating robots, the everlasting Christmas of a millennial wish-list, the grindingly cruel chaos of an uber-VUCA world and a force-feed wellbeing-at-all-costs agenda.
There is an approach that is not only simple, but also attainable and universal. Everyone deserves a fantastic workplace, and everyone can have one by following a framework that applies to any sector or location, with any available budget and to any desired workstyle (yes, even those that are not agile).
The Elemental Workplace is an idea that has been percolating since 2013 through the workessence blog. It originally grew out of a concern that a small number of well-funded organisations were creating workplaces that bore increasingly less resemblance to the perennial mediocrity suffered by most. It is possible to apply a simple sense to workplace that can enable people to work effectively, allow the organisation to function efficiently and express its personality and DNA through its workplace and in the ether, to tread lightly on the planet and energise its occupants
Pearls of elemental wisdom about workplace design and management
The greatest conundrum in the endless debate about whether the workplace affects people’s wellbeing and productivity is that it’s still going on at all. We’ve known for decades that people are affected in profound and meaningful ways by their surroundings and the culture in which they work. We know which factors are most important and which work in the absence of others. We know how these factors have shifted in response to changing working cultures and technological advances. And we know which are glib distractions from the real deal.
The fact that the debate is ongoing is what makes Neil Usher’s new book The Elemental Workplace so vital. The book declares itself a guide offering a “simple, easy-to-follow way why you need a fantastic workplace, how to create it and what it comprises”. This statement of intent is reflected in the book’s title, which is descriptive of its pared back approach and the fundamental characteristics of a workplace that inspires and motivates people and addresses their health and wellbeing.
The first thing to say is that it’s well written. Neil has obviously put in his 10,000 hours to sharpen his prose and also draws on a range of influences to illustrate his points, from the academic to the artistic, which makes the book extremely digestible.
This shouldn’t be underestimated, because it may be that the reasons we still have to debate the issue of workplace productivity are rooted in the deliberately arcane obscurantism of researchers, coupled with the misdirections of commercial influences. The Elemental Workplace swerves both.