Office design – the key to employee happiness

Many employers will tell you that when running a business, people are your prime asset. Your company’s success or failure depends on the work delivered by the people on your payroll, making it important to ensure they’re putting their best foot forward at all times. One way to achieve that is by keeping staff happy, since unhappy employees can damage your business’ bottom line.

As it turns out, the best way to do that is by improving your office design. Office search engine Office Genie asked 2,000 UK workers about their working environment in an attempt to find out which factors contribute most to workplace happiness. Workplace design came out on top with employees indicating the right design can boost their happiness by a whopping 33%. In comparison, other factors such as temperature (5%), light (6%), noise (8%), and social interaction levels (8%) have a very limited impact.

Another potential game changer when it comes to keeping your staff content is flexible working, with participants indicating the ability to work from home can increase workplace happiness by 12%.

Commenting on the findings, Peter Ames, head of strategy at Office Genie, said: “At Genie we’ve long been advocates of the idea that workplace design has a huge impact on employee happiness. Providing people with the environment they need in which to work at their best is arguably the most important step in ensuring staff are happy and also productive.”

He added that the data shows exactly why dull and dreary offices have become outdated. “In the modern workplace, where things such as flexible working are increasingly at the forefront of workers concerns, we’d urge an even stronger focus on factors such as design and layout.”

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