Effective Employee Engagement Strategies With Office Designs

By improving employee engagement strategies in your business, you will establish a positive emotional connection within your organization. And a positive office environment helps boost employee engagement and increases their efficiency and productivity while encouraging them to stay longer in their jobs.

Improving your office environment creates a comfortable space for employees, cultivates a sense of belonging, and builds an ideal setting that keeps them happy.

According to the studies conducted by LevelingUp, companies with happy employees are said to outperform the competition by 20 per cent. Satisfied and engaged employees go the extra mile to boost your business. So, improving the work environment you offer your employees must be your top priority.

Did you know your office space design plays a crucial role in fostering a better work environment for your employees? In this post, we will understand how revamping your office design can impact employee engagement and productivity.

5 Effective Employee Engagement Strategies With Office Designs

Here are some practical ways office design impacts employee engagement strategies:

1. Open Plan Layout to Make Everyone Feel Included

Ensure a structured layout and adequate space in your offices by adopting an open-plan arrangement to position the workstations.

This flexible layout promotes better team collaboration and boosts creativity and innovation besides ensuring proper space utilization. It makes all the employees feel included and valued by the organization irrespective of their designation.

Further, open spaces and workplace ergonomics prevent a sedentary lifestyle that could lead to serious health conditions, such as obesity, depression, stress, heart disease, and more. 

Follow these tips to plan your open office space.

• Optimize your office space for movement and encourage better employee collaboration and communication. Ensure that every area of your office is easily accessible by experimenting with multiple layouts. 

• Invest in suitable furniture, such as ergonomic chairs, work tables, chest of drawers, and more to provide comfort to the employees. This will help them maintain a proper working posture and work productively without getting fatigued.

• Encourage a layout where all team members sit and work together. This will instil a culture of equality and inclusivity in your organization.

2. Designated Areas to Foster Better Team Collaboration

Incorporate dedicated spaces in your office to develop a sense of comfort, collaboration, health, and community among your employees.

Create separate work areas for specific types of work and allow employees to choose a desired work area depending on their work assignments. This will help them focus better and deliver quality results on time.

Some of these areas you can include in your workspace design are:

• Collaborative workspaces – Create collaborative workspaces that allow a group of employees to brainstorm and work together on their tasks without disturbing other employees in the office.

• Quiet areas – Integrate quiet spaces in your office design to provide employees with privacy and boost concentration when completing their tasks.

• Meeting spaces – Create dedicated meeting spaces to conduct team meetings, client meetings, conferences, and more.

• Recreation zones – Include a gaming area or a space for meditation to allow employees to take a break from work and relax their minds. You can also build outdoor gardens as de-stress zones to encourage employees to spend some time in nature.

• Kitchen and pantry – Provide employees with a casual space for lunch hours and coffee breaks. Place comfortable couches for easy socializing and networking.

3. Aesthetic Interiors to Elevate the Employee Mood

Every element of interior design contributes significantly to employee satisfaction, productivity, and engagement. A good-looking office with aesthetic interiors can positively impact your ability to attract, engage, and retain top talent. 

Here are some tips you can follow to transform traditional offices into modern visually-appealing ones.

• Add a variety of hues to the office design as enough research shows that colours positively impact employee productivity. For example, use blue to boost concentration, yellow to promote optimism, white to give a professional vibe, grey to offer a sophisticated look, and more.

• Ensure adequate natural lighting and electric lighting sources for proper illumination to all corners of your office. Excellent lighting creates a refreshing working environment that keeps your employees energized.

• Introduce natural elements, such as textured walls, indoor plants, stone counters, nature-inspired artwork, and more into your office design. In fact, the addition of indoor plants to office spaces reduces overall stress by 60 per cent.

• Add interest to the office space by putting up art and decor items. These items are a pleasant sight for employees, allowing them to relax and achieve their daily work objectives.

4. Integrated Technology to Boost Employee Experiences

Technology has been transforming office spaces to make it convenient for businesses to carry out their day-to-day operations.

By integrating digital systems into office design, many companies have observed improved employee performance, better engagement, and faster decision-making among their teams. It motivates the employees to achieve their potential and promote job satisfaction, thereby boosting their productivity at work.

Here are some suggestions you can incorporate to digitize your office spaces and boost employee experiences.

• Create a resource area that contains dedicated office equipment, such as printers, scanners, photocopy machines, and more to save space and refrain employees from disturbing each other during work hours.

• Equip your conference rooms and meeting spaces with all the required gadgets, such as web cameras, telephones, laptops, presentation screens, and more so that your team does not have to spend time setting it up before the meeting.

• Offer charging stations at multiple places in the office, such as phone booths, huddle rooms, lounge areas and more providing employees with the flexibility to work from anywhere they want.

• Eliminate wires, sockets, and other clutter from the workstations and conference rooms by placing them under the tables. In fact, 41 per cent of employees believe that a tidy and organized workspace has enhanced their productivity.

• Invest in various software tools like desk reservation software, meeting room booking tools, and more to aid employee engagement and boost productivity.

5. Wellness-Centered Spaces to Support Employee Wellbeing

Incorporating health and well-being-oriented design provides a sense of safety to the employees. It boosts team morale, fosters stronger communication, and engages employees with your organization.

However, it is crucial to understand the needs of the employees before investing in introducing a well-being-inspired design. Remember there is no one-size-fits-all design approach to introduce wellness-centred design.

Here are a few tips to consider when designing your office that prioritizes employee health and well-being.

• Introduce wellness spaces, such as meditation zones, specialized rooms for breastfeeding mothers, and more to your office design. Ensure that these spaces are located in a secluded corner of your office so that the employees do not feel any pressure or fear of being judged when using the wellness room.

• Incorporate relaxing colour palettes to build a calming work environment. Take measures to keep the workplace clean and hygienic for utmost comfort.

• Equip spaces with a recliner or a sofa for making break time relaxing. Add a coffee table and proper lighting, and voila, you have created a relaxed setting for your employees.

Creating a comfortable workspace will help your employees to get through a challenging day and inspire a positive culture at your workplace.

Wrapping Up

Office design hugely impacts employee engagement and productivity. Hence, proper design planning is important to build collaborative workspaces that boost employee productivity and make them feel more engaged at work. 

Follow the tips above to design and revamp your office space and increase workforce efficiency and employee retention rates.