Is an open office environment beneficial or detrimental to or for your workforce? How does it affect the productivity, collaboration, creativity, and well-being of employees and their day-to-day operations?

Abstract

The pursuit by organisations of the optimal blueprint that is meant to maximise employee potential led countless firms to restructure their office spaces to incorporate transparent open plan offices with few structural barriers between co-workers. This paper begins by highlighting the impact that an open office work environment has on four significant organisational outcomes: employees’ productivity, creativity, collaboration, and well-being. The findings of available studies coupled with thorough insights are synthesised to determine whether the current trend of adopting an open plan environment is harmful or beneficial to the short and long-term promotion of a successful establishment. The paper proceeds to present a series of recommendations that should be taken into consideration by organisations that possess open office layouts and by companies that plan to convert to an open-space work environment. Finally, it concludes that an open office design has an advantageous impact on an employee’s productivity, creativity, collaboration, and well-being in specific instances only. These instances include where the open layout is implemented for a suitable type of work style paired with the support of an organisation’s workforce who are prepared to adjust the organisational culture to reflect the values that an open office layout upholds.