By Charu Bahri

 Plan the layout well

Size up space: The first step in designing a productive office is to size up space available to you at its most basic level–does it offer suitable temperature control, air quality, noise control, and sufficient natural and artificial lighting? "These essentials must be in place since no amount of shoe-shining can change these basic attributes," says Aparna Kunde-Kowli, partner at K+A, a Mumbai-based architectural firm.

"Considering that employees spend most of their waking hours in office, business owners owe it to them to create a physical environment that is conducive to their well-being," says Vinod Panjwani, director of Aura Global Furniture.

If a space comes pre-installed with services like air-conditioning and water treatment systems, check out whether they are reliable and of sufficient capacity. Otherwise, select systems that will hold good for the maximum number of employees you intend to seat in the space.

Map the layout: Next, plan what goes where. Typically, the reception lobby and visitors' facilities will be located at the entrance. Other departments should be laid out so as to facilitate information flow–more so in offices entertaining clients. This also involves understanding how employees communicate and the noise levels areas are likely to generate. "Usually, partitions are required to prevent sounds from spilling over from noisier departments and collaborative areas, and to offer senior managers some privacy," explains Geeta Uppal, principal architect, Sandeep Geeta & Associates.

Technology and services needs also determine the layout of an office, as does running cost. For instance, locating departments that regularly work late hours in one section helps reduce air-conditioning costs. The area you need to be most secure should generally be centrally located and equipped with appropriate security systems. Your server rooms and computer network centres require specific wiring, and should be planned to accommodate future expansion.

Practical considerations drive good design. For example, a common printer and photocopier room should be planned, so it is equidistant from the departments it serves. "Common printer rooms usually cater to 15 to 20 employees. Walking to and fro the room offers the end user some much-needed exercise," says Kowli.

Provide for facilities: You'll also need to allocate space for amenities like toilets, pantries and drinking water dispensers. Rule of thumb suggests creating one easily accessible washroom for every 15 to 20 percent employees. If your office is spread over more than one floor, these facilities should be made available on each level. For areas where a water connection isn't possible, Kowli recommends creating a dry pantry equipped with an espresso machine, a vending machine, and a water dispenser.

"Most multi-storey corporate offices also have a common cafeteria catering to one-third of the staff at a time," she adds. A pantry on each floor and a cafeteria go a long way in helping people love their workplace.

If you're designing a new office, you may also see benefit in reducing the size of workstation cubicles, or in moving employees out of offices into cubes. The extra space can be utilised for other perks, maybe a gym with attached showers, or a table tennis room.

 Evolve your signature style

Colour schemes: "Colour offers employees some respite from monotony. An office's colour scheme speaks volumes about its 'formality' quotient," says Uppal. Bright colours like vermillion red, fresh lime, bright mango, indigo and hot pink, with or without jazzy metallic shades help create fun spaces that encourage creativity. On the other hand, shades of brown, beige, grey, cream, and white infuse spaces with a sense of seriousness.

"Our office partitions are orange and blue since these colours are lively and also part of our logo. We opted for walls painted white as this amplifies artificial lighting," says Fresherworld's Joseph.

Companies are increasingly including their logo or brand colours in their architectural palette–walls, floors, ceilings, furniture and furnishings. "We used shades of green when designing the office of a sustainable engineering consultancy since this helped bring out the mission of the firm," says Deepak Gupta, principal architect, D+R Design.

Corporate culture: Use your office to reflect your corporate culture. This involves designing spaces that mirror the image the company wants to project to its customers and employees. For instance, Joseph wanted to foster an open culture. "So we opted for no enclosed spaces other than discussion rooms and lower partitions between cubicles– 4 feet versus the conventional 4.5 feet."

The materials chosen to do up an office can also emphasise its corporate values. Kowli observes that offices adhering to an open theme usually opt for meeting rooms that are glass-walled or fully-glazed with frosting film bands for privacy. Where partitions are the office norm, meeting rooms may be shut off by painted gypsum or laminate-clad wooden partitions, or in some cases, acoustic panelling for sound control. Some offices may opt to combine open and closed meeting rooms.

Vastu rules: Many business owners want to ensure the office space is aligned with the principles of Vastu. Harmonising the two isn't always easy. "There were no office buildings of the kind we see nowadays around when Vastu was written," observes Gupta. Still, he suggests rules can be applied broadly.

For instance, Vastu suggests that the entrance of a home be oriented towards the north-east. Office entrances may be oriented likewise. The north-west corner of a home housed the vault or the safe where money was kept. So, the accounting and finance departments of an office may be situated in the north-west. A CEO's cabin, corresponding to the master bedroom, should be located in the south-west corner. Vastu says a home's north-east corner should be open. In an office, it becomes a good place for a lobby or conference room. More simply, the pantry goes where the kitchen was located – in the south-east. Vastu also proposes facing northward when working or negotiating a deal, facing eastwards when learning, and that staircases should follow a clockwise pattern.

"Given the challenges associated with applying Vastu to modern spaces, architects can at best keep the zones similar," adds Gupta.

 Work flexibility into the design

Some offices, such as those of IT, accounting, engineering, legal, and architectural firms may benefit from flexible seating arrangements, which Gupta says "help team-building and make it easy to regroup to execute projects". Many offices, especially in information technology and software industries, are increasingly moving towards workspaces that aren't personalised. Temporary and mobile staff needs separate seating as well, adds Panjwani. "Technicians and employees working on sites need a place to touch down to understand their work assignments and write out reports."

High-tech lighting and temperature sensors are also fast changing the concept of comfort in the workplace. "Adapting to such changes allow the user some leeway to adjust the office ambience to his comfort. But this can increase costs without associated returns and can be misused," cautions Uppal.

	EMAIL THIS ARTICLE	PRINT THIS PAGE