Research Review and Recommendations

Blackburn Young Office Solutions researches links between workspace design and human behavior, health and performance, and the quality of the users’ experience. We share and apply what we learn to inform product development and help our customers shape their work environments.

Forty years after the introduction of the cubicle, the debate over its benefits continues. Open-plan offices have been found to have both positive effects (e.g., increased employee communication and interaction, flexibility, ability to house more employees, reduced set-up and renovation times) and negative effects (e.g., increased noise, distractions, perceived crowding, and decreased privacy) (Brennan, et. al., 2002; Maher and von Hippel, 2005).

We define “open plan” as an environment comprised of systems furniture and “enclosed private offices” as workspaces completely enclosed with dry wall and a door. In this paper, we review relevant research on open plan and enclosed private offices related to a variety of behavioral and technical issues. We close this paper with design recommendations and a brief summary of the benefits of each of these approaches based on our research.

As part of this review we examine the following topics:

• How work style influences workspace preference.
• Workspace and job satisfaction.
• How workspace is evolving as an indicator of status.
• Effects of workspace type on collaboration.
• Workspace type and noise issues.
• Workspace for learning and mentoring.
• Cost and strategic implications of open and enclosed workspaces

Work Style Influences Workspace Preference

In most industries and organizations, there are multiple work styles and preferences for different types of workspaces. Blackburn Young Office Solutions research examined workspace type preferences of high technology workers and found that their preference for open or enclosed work environments was based on work style and the type of work the individual performs. Computer programmers, who tend to be more social and collaborative at work, preferred open plan workstations with “seated height privacy”; in other words, one cannot see over a panel while seated. Software developers and engineers, whose work tends to require higher levels of concentration and freedom from distraction, preferred a private office with a door. In the absence of a private office, they are willing to work in open plan environments that provide “standing height privacy,” meaning the ability to stand without seeing over the panel.

Workspace and Job Satisfaction

Yildirim, et. al. (2007) examined the impact of proximity to a window and open plan workstation partition height on employee satisfaction. The results indicated that visual access to a window from the workspace positively affected employee satisfaction. Satisfaction was even more enhanced for employees with 60” panel height workstations and a view to a window, presumably because that height partition optimizes visual privacy and minimizes distractions and interruptions. Vietch, et. al. (2007) studied 779 open-plan office occupants from nine government and private sector office buildings in five large Canadian and US cities. They found that open-plan office occupants who were more satisfied with their environments were also more satisfied with their jobs, suggesting a role for the physical environment in organizational well-being and effectiveness.

Workspace as a Status Indicator

Even as organizations attempt to minimize the status implications of office type, more than half of the participants in another Blackburn Young Office Solutions study reported that private offices communicate higher status than open plan workspaces. The research also showed that most employees moving from a private office to an open plan workstation perceive a loss of status and benefits. This, in part, explains the resistance organizations encounter when trying to migrate from enclosed workspace to open workspace standards. However, the emphasis on office type as a primary status marker is being eroded as highly mobile work styles become more common (thus de-emphasizing the importance of the individual office) and technology “toys” such as the Blackberry, iPhone and other devices rival or even replace the individual workspace as a status indicator.