siliconindia | | Jan - March 20208IN MYOPINIONThe eternal debate on work-life balance will be moot in Decade 2020. While it was a matter of concern as we went across the millennium with work increasingly intruding into personal space, the trend is turning and offices are becoming the second home. This is not to mean that people are spending more time at offices but that the offices are becoming more personal, comfortable and casual ­ traits usually attributed to the home. "Feeling at home in your office" could be a tagline for some future offices. Most innovation happening in the domain of workplace design now will ultimately lead to blurring of this line between home and office in Decade 2020. The end objectives though, remain same. What will a well-designed workplace strive to achieve? It will need to be productive, flexible, comfortable and economical. All this will be assisted through coordinated use of technology, advancement of building materials, furniture and equipment and last but not the least, company culture, policy, processes and systems. Admittedly, in the future, the workplace designer will no longer just be that-lonely-guy-with-an-aesthetic-sense. (S)he will have to team up closely with the Senior Management, Human Resources, IT specialists, Facility Managers and above all, every user group to deliver that perfect office.The Home, on the other hand, is perceived as a personal place. It usually offers certain freedom, comfort and familiarity of surroundings. Between this DON'T GO TO OFFICE. GO HOMEBy Sandeep Roy, COO, NCUBESandeep has over 25 years of experience in design and project management of major landmark projects across IndiaHome and that Office, is a Commute, which is the least personalised and practically impossible to alter. These are the three stages of existence that everyone faces every day and the marked variation in these conditions lead to conflict. That is exactly why the future offices will try to achieve uniformity of environment and make you feel at home when in the office. [Pic 01: Feel at Home: The Living and Dining Room comes to Office]Decisions that will MatterHow will the offices physically achieve this? What choices will the companies have to make in order to design and build their dream offices in Decade 2020? Flexibility of Spatial Usage: The design brief in future will not be definitive about the number of cabins, work stations, hierarchy, meeting rooms etc. Instead, there will be a broad range of functions and number of people over a period of the expected life of the premise. This trend is already observed and designers are giving fancy names like "Agile Working" to the solutions. With prohibitive real estate costs, future spaces will be convertible and adaptable to multiple functions. [Pic 02: The Expanding Meeting Room, Small by default, Big when you need one] Privacy vs Collaboration: A workplace has to cater to both Thinking Time and Collaboration Time for any user. Designers call it "Activity Based Settings"[Pic 03:Activity Based Setting] where a person is not tied to the same desk for everything they do throughout the day. For different functions (Activities), there are different arrangements (Settings). There can be the comfort of a bean bag or a stand up meeting or simply the work-desk. The Thinking work needs a private setting, the Brainstorming Session needs a collaborative setting and in our future office, providing the right setting for the right work will achieve productivity and efficiency from every staff. [Pic 04: Just Get the Work Done: The Cubicle in the background or the Lounge in Front] Density and Openness: Optimum Density (number of people per square foot of Sandeep Roy, COO
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