The impact of the ‘open’ workspace on human collaboration

Abstract

Organizations’ pursuit of increased workplace collaboration has led managers to transform traditional office spaces into ‘open’, transparency-enhancing architectures with fewer walls, doors and other spatial boundaries, yet there is scant direct empirical research on how human interaction patterns change as a result of these architectural changes. In two intervention-based field studies of corporate headquarters transitioning to more open office spaces, we empirically examined—using digital data from advanced wearable devices and from electronic communication servers—the effect of open office architectures on employees' face-to-face, email and instant messaging (IM) interaction patterns. Contrary to common belief, the volume of face-to-face interaction decreased significantly (approx. 70%) in both cases, with an associated increase in electronic interaction. In short, rather than prompting increasingly vibrant face-to-face collaboration, open architecture appeared to trigger a natural human response to socially withdraw from officemates and interact instead over email and IM. This is the first study to empirically measure both face-to-face and electronic interaction before and after the adoption of open office architecture. The results inform our understanding of the impact on human behaviour of workspaces that trend towards fewer spatial boundaries.This article is part of the theme issue ‘Interdisciplinary approaches for uncovering the impacts of architecture on collective behaviour’.

Interdisciplinary approaches for uncovering the impacts of architecture on collective behaviour

“…Both animals and humans can be tracked using devices that emit radio frequency. Human movements have been tracked by following cell phone signals or radio-frequency-based devices [31,32]. Similarly, the movement of ants has been tracked using RFID tags [27].…”

“…High-resolution movement patterns cannot always be achieved using such devices, so, more commonly, the type of information obtained from wearable devises is less granular. Such devices can be used to track interactions directly, through proximity detection in humans [32] and animals [33], and they can record movements in and out of certain spaces, such as stations of public transportation in human movements [8] and the movements of animals in and out of their nests [34,35]. Another common way to obtain the movement patterns of both humans and animals is image analysis.…”

“…In human studies, tracking hardware may capture audio so that communication can be recorded, or, at least, documented (e.g. who is speaking and for how long) [32]. A behaviour that is often overlooked, but could be important, is stopping behaviour.…”

“…Bernstein & Turban [32] cover a persistent debate in organizational theory about how spatial boundaries in offices influence collective behaviour and various organizational outcomes. Originally, social science theory suggested that open plan offices would increase contact between employees and improve social interactions.…”

“…The findings on open plan offices are mixed, with many studies finding a lack of employee satisfaction with these architectural design changes. In a unique study combining digital data of physical interactions with electronic communications, Bernstein & Turban [32] study what happens when organizations change from traditional workspace design to open office architectures. Across two separate studies, with different organizations, they find consistent results.…”