Really? What is an Agile Workspace?

Fake News Warning

There are companies in the Office Furniture Industry claiming to have flexible furniture for Agile Work.

If their products still connect to 120V wiring, how can they claim to be “agile”?

System Furniture lines that require expensive-to-install and expensive-to-change power connections are anything but “agile”. They are monuments to past thinking.

And how can they claim to be committed to sustainability with these products? Few organizations can accurately forecast their staffing needs more than a few quarters ahead. When they need to re-layout their offices, much of the previous expense in power infrastructure is lost. Wasted. And seldom properly re-used, re-deployed, or recycled.

These companies say the right things but, in practice, their actions betray them.

Respond! Console Desks use battery power for powering laptops, monitors, wireless phone chargers, and sit-stand adjustments.

Agile Office Furniture is Flexible Office Furniture

If you see this, you are not working in an Agile Office.

We are witnessing the dawn of battery-powered office furniture. Our thinking is no longer constrained by the need for 120V power.

We can make furniture movable and office layouts easy to configure. We can eliminate tangles of cords, eliminate unsightly clutter and improve housekeeping. And we contribute to a more sustainable future by charging during off-peak hours and lessening the demand on the grid during peak hours.

Dealing with Uncertainty

For those considering Hybrid Work practices in their businesses, the first obstacle is uncertainty. Most organizations recognize the value of Hybrid Work but are uncertain about who, when, and how many people will be working from home or working in the office at any given time.

When we developed the concepts for Respond!, we viewed uncertainty about the configuration of an organization as a pain point that needed a solution. Not that there wasn’t any uncertainty about the size, growth, and structure of organizations before. Hybrid work just brings more uncertainty.

Hybrid work itself is not a fixed concept. It is not predicated on fixed work schedules. There may be times when people can work from home for several days or weeks, other times consistently in the office, and/or every conceivable combination of work practices.

Low Cost Change

Wheels make installation and reconfiguration amazingly simple.

Battery-powered workstations allowed us to think about flexibility in new ways. The first aspect of “flexibility” to re-think meant designing furniture that is easily movable enabling real-time layout changes and multi-purpose workstations separating personal work tools onto their own portable products.

To emphasize the message about flexibility, we added wheels. We put casters on every product in the line. And we didn’t stop our thinking there. No dinky wheels for us. No hesitation. We specified 200mm casters, very large in comparison to other office furniture products. We want users to know and be empowered to change their office layouts to suit their work and improve productivity. You no longer have to contract an electrician or an installation crew to change a layout.

If your Hybrid Work practices change, so can your office layout.

More flexibility

The second way we added flexibility was by incorporating product line features that adapt to casual, intense, and group work situations. Not only can the furniture move, so can people. The notion that you plant yourself in one position seated behind your desk is unhealthy, unproductive, and unreasonable.

As computers increasingly do routine tasks, the roles of people become more divergent. There may be times when you intensely work by yourself on a task, other times when you meet with one or more colleagues, and yet other times in more formal, planned meetings.

We decided a workplace should be more than just a choice between private workstations and conference rooms. We incorporated casual products that enable one-on-one interactions, casual group workspaces, and ways to just drop into the office for a few hours between appointments.

If you need a different way to work, just go there.

And more flexibility

The third way we added flexibility is to create products that are interchangeable and configurable. In other words, a “system” of products, not just a collection of products. Our mobile screens have configuration options. They can divide or surround workstations. Console desks and casual seating products can be swapped without changing screen configurations.

We developed schemes around two sizes. We have a series of generous 72” desks and casual products that work with our 48” mobile screens. And we have more compact 60” desks that work with our 36” mobile screens.

If your workplaces need multiple monitors or more desktop space, you can go big. If your workplaces can be simple, you can specify simple.