March 22, 2013

Office design goes to the movies. Part 2 – 24 Hour Party People

by Mark Eltringham • Furniture, Products, Workplace design

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Warning: contains strong language. Factory Records’ Rob Gretton disagrees somewhat with Tony Wilson’s purchase of an expensive table for the firm’s new offices in Michael Winterbottom’s wonderful take on the Madchester scene of the 1980s. But what really sets him off is the word ‘London’. Particular disdain is reserved for the fact the table is made of MDF. Deskheads will recognise the unmistakable application of a CNC machine in its manufacture and the inevitable iconic seating. And the morals are these – involve everybody in purchasing decisions and don’t fall into the trap of believing what they do in London is cool.

March 21, 2013

Video: how networks of engaged people can achieve more than nations

by Mark Eltringham • Architecture, Comment, Facilities management, Property, Technology, Workplace design

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In spite of all its flaws, the Internet can empower people to address specific issues in ways that exceed the abilities of nation states. In this energising talk for the Royal Society for the Arts, Don Tapscott, a Canadian businessman and now one of the world’s leading authorities on the impact of technology on people and societies, explores the idea that engaged and connected people can work together to innovate and solve issues that can seem intractable to the world’s governments and international bodies, including the most serious demographic and environmental challenges we all face.

February 12, 2013

Whatever the office of the future is, it should be there to serve people

by Mark Eltringham • Comment, Facilities management, Furniture, Technology, Workplace, Workplace design

Futurology is notoriously a mug’s game. Especially when it comes to making predictions about technology. Just ask Ken Olson, the founder of DEC who in 1977 pronounced that ‘there is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home’. Or Bill Gates himself who once claimed that Microsoft ‘will never make a 32 bit operating system’. But that shouldn’t make us blind to those predictions that we know will largely come true, not least those based on what we know is happening in the present. This is typified by research carried out by Cass Business School and Henley Business School and presented in a book called Future Work: How Businesses Can Adapt and Thrive in the New World of Work. It found that two-thirds of the 360 managers it surveyed believe that there would be a revolution in working practices over the coming decade. Ninety per cent said that staff were more productive when empowered to decide when and where and how to work.

January 10, 2025

The Sustainable Design Forum returns

by Freddie Steele • Environment, News, Workplace design

The Sustainable Design Forum – a one-day interactive event designed specifically for workplace designers and specifiers – is returning to the Crypt on the Green in Clerkenwell, London for its third year on Thursday 25th April 2025. With a focus on ‘People and Planet’, this year’s event has been expanded to include additional workplace topics. More →

January 7, 2025

Here’s how to support neurodivergent employees at work

by Stephanie Clarke • Comment, Wellbeing, Workplace

Businesses have much to gain from neurodivergent employees. According to a recent Deloitte report “teams with neurodivergent professionals in some roles can be 30 percent more productive than those without them”. Benefits of neurodivergent individuals to the workplace – according to the CIPD, range from “problem-solving, to creative insights and visual spatial thinking.” More →

January 3, 2025

Lack of space continues to hold back a ‘return to office’

by Marvin Gort • News, Property, Workplace design

Workers are resisting the so-called return to office due to a lack of desk space, following widespread reductions by companies in the wake of Covid. A fifth of workers cited a shortage of desks and facilities among their top three reasons for avoiding the office, according to a survey by real estate consultancy Remit Consulting. The firm claims that businesses may have scaled back desk numbers too aggressively after the pandemic spurred a rise in home working. More →

January 3, 2025

If you want to get ahead in your career, get in to the office, report argues

by Neil Franklin • Flexible working, News, Workplace

Businesses are increasingly likely to prioritise workers willing to come into the office for pay rises and promotions, according to a new poll from Reed Group. A year ago Reed.co.uk, which deals with over 30 million job applications a year, predicted that employers would increasingly mandate days in the office and would prioritise what it called the ‘in-person premium’. More →

December 23, 2024

Brain rot is the word of the year and we only have ourselves to blame

by Mark Eltringham • AI, Comment

Brain rot is the word or phrase of the year 2024 according to the Oxford University Press. And right on time, we have the viral story of the hawk tuah girl meme coin rug pull to prove it. If you don’t know what any of that means, then do yourself a favour by not finding out. I do know and feel as if something meaningful and important has been cauterized from my brain for ever to make way for it. More →

December 20, 2024

Workplace politics: When free speech becomes a faux pas

by David Browne • Features, Workplace

$Tt's important for firms to understand how to approach the potentially fractious issue of workplace politics$ After a politically turbulent year, many employers are finding their workplaces more divided, with political views being brought into the office and the lines between free speech and inappropriate discussion increasingly blurred. So it’s important for firms to understand how to approach the potentially fractious issue of workplace politics. Just recently, a former UKIP councillor claimed that she was subject to bullying and harassment by her charity employer for expressing pro-Brexit views, which she argued was a legally-protected belief. More →

December 19, 2024

The Internet and a pile of turtles that goes all the way down

by Mark Eltringham • Comment, Technology

In his 1998 book A Brief History of Time, Stephen Hawking relates the following anecdote: “A well-known scientist (some say it was Bertrand Russell) once gave a public lecture on astronomy. He described how the earth orbits around the sun and how the sun, in turn, orbits around the centre of a vast collection of stars called our galaxy. At the end of the lecture, a little old lady at the back of the room got up and said: “What you have told us is rubbish. The world is really a flat plate supported on the back of a giant tortoise.” The scientist gave a superior smile before replying, “What is the tortoise standing on?” “You’re very clever, young man, very clever,” said the old lady. “But it’s turtles all the way down!”

December 18, 2024

NETGEAR adds blazing fast 5G WiFi 6 mobile router to Nighthawk lineup

by Freddie Steele • Company news, Flexible working, Technology

NETGEAR, the provider of award-winning connected products designed to simplify and improve people’s lives, has expanded its unlocked 5G mobile router lineup with the launch of the NETGEAR Nighthawk® M3 Mobile Hotspot Router (MH3150). The new product meets the growing demands for accessible and powerful WiFi coupled with advanced security features anywhere, anytime. More →

December 18, 2024

A divine spark of inspiration for office occupiers and designers

by Mark Eltringham • Briefing, Premium Content, Workplace design

Organisations are having to rethink the form and function of their offices in ways unprecedented in their relatively short history. And perhaps the biggest challenge is to create places to work that reflect the organisation’s culture and the needs of the people who work there (some of the time). One possible framework for aligning an office design model with the culture of the organisation is presented in a supplement published for IN Magazine called Gods of Work. Published in partnership with Modus, it draws on management and organisational theory and established models of office design to suggest solutions to some of the challenges facing organisations as they rethink the way they work. The office of the future for most organisations will be smaller, but much better and we hope this becomes an invaluable guide for those setting out on that path.