CREJ

42 / BUILDING DIALOGUE / December 2018 ELEMENTS Office Plan The Closed-Plan: Is Office Shame a Factor? E ven the concept of a closed-plan office to- day seems unacceptable if not wildly un- imaginable. Most office employees likely don’t know what a closed office even looks like. And why would they? The seismic shifts in work- place design have illustrated just how fleeting a cultural movement can be in a relatively short pe- riod of time. The closed or “traditional” office would eventual- ly give way to the fully open office, which is active- ly morphing into any number of hybrid designs as work styles continue to evolve. Whatever these hy- brids might look like, they are clearly primarily open in design. In fact, about 70 percent of all offices in the United States are open-plan, according to the Interna- tional Facility Management Association. That leaves a significant block still favoring a closed design. That is, the closed-plan is dominated by private offices along the perimeter with reception and conference areas near the entrance, perhaps a kitchen or break space, and cubicles at the core if any open spaces exist at all. This type of design is virtually anti-everything ac- cording to what we’ve been conditioned to accept. It most certainly is non-collaborative, scarce on op- portunities for flexibility or agility. Incidental per- son-to-person communication is difficult to attain. Structurally, it’s a siloed environment, sparse, isolat- ed from the outside world. And, shockingly, there are no pingpong tables or beer taps. In fact, the focus is on work and work only. There are no extraneous dis- tractions within the office to entice employees to so- cialize after hours or during business hours for that matter. One well-established, Denver-based oil-and-gas firm is flourishing in a closed-plan environment. Ev- eryone gets a fixed, private office, even the part-tim- ers. There are no cubicles in the office and no one is posted at the modest reception area. Although there is a kitchen, most workers eat lunch at their desks. The culture is – and always has been – primarily egal- itarian, but top executives are rewarded with larger spaces along the windows. Collaboration is confined to the firm’s conference room and a single, enclosed huddle space. A company representative says the firm has earnestly studied other options for the office but concludes that, “We value the quality of quiet time to cultivate our way of doing business. We know what we do best, and culturally, we could not excel in an open environment. So why go any further?” Why indeed. What we have known for well over a decade is that the open-plan office has been a di- saster while the closed-plan has continued to meet with a significant percentage of success. The closed- plan office is a baseline to which other types are com- pared. Although there are hybrids for each style, it is the open-plan that continues to fall under the most scrutiny as companies search for a style and culture most adaptive to their employee base. Tia Jenkins President, Kieding A closed-plan office suite is low on collaborative and amenities space but offers quiet, privacy, and a feeling of own- ership for its inhabitants. Private offices can cost as much as 35 percent more to build-out, but still account for 30 percent of office types in the U.S.