How Millennials Are Making Office Design Healthier

Posted on April 24, 2017

You might not have expected office Feng Shui to represent a particularly pronounced intergenerational rift, but, the truth is, millennials are bringing new ideas to the table when it comes to office design trends.

Blending Fun And Business

We hear you: You’re not supposed to do that. But with some thoughtful office design, your company can promote a fun-loving corporate culture without compromising your focus or your productivity. In fact, some of the most successful companies you’ll find play host to such seemingly ill-matched activities as beach volleyball and rocket science.

Blending your productivity-focused and fun-centric areas, at least within reason, sends a powerful message to your workers: We’re not all business here, and you don’t have to be afraid to step away from your work and unwind. Here are the desk clumps, and here is the foosball table. We trust you to make an adult decision.

The importance of this really can’t be understated. By some accounts, millennials are the most stressed-out generation ever, so trundling off to a workplace each day to spend time in an environment that encourages something other than a laser-like focus on the bottom line could open the door to a happier and healthier workplace overall.

Coworking Offices

You’ve probably read plenty of articles about millennials leaving the traditional office environment to work from home. As it turns out, there’s a compromise available — and it brings us to our next millennial-led office design trend.

Coworking offices aren’t traditional offices, and they’re not work-from-home situations. Instead, they’re nicely appointed and meticulously maintained shared workspaces that can be accessed for a weekly or monthly fee. Spaces like these provide free-spirited millennials with surroundings that are comfortable and functional without feeling stifling, and, for young folks who want the telecommuting experience without maintaining an office at home, they’re a great fit.

Interestingly, folks who work in spaces like these generally report feeling like their work is more meaningful. Why argue with results like those?

The Eco-Friendly Workplace

Since no generation has stared down the barrel of manmade climate change quite like millennials, no generation before them has taken eco-friendliness quite so seriously. The good news on the decorating front is that it’s quite easy to bring a concern for the environment into our design schemes in the workplace.

Inspired in part by this most vocal generation insisting on environmentally-sound business practices and in part by the obvious cost savings involved, offices everywhere are investing in eco-friendlier lighting and building with more sustainable materials.

For example: LED bulbs — even the still somewhat uncommon variety that can replace fluorescent tube-style lights — provide low-wattage lighting for earth-conscious offices. Lighting our surroundings with electricity represents 21% of the commercial world’s energy use. Even modest monthly savings made here translate into improvements for your bottom-line.

Literally Greening The Office

“Going green” figuratively is a great choice for just about every company, but bringing some literal greenness into the office can be just as popular — and good for our lungs, too.

Yes, the millennial generation marks a shift toward plant-friendly work environments. If allergies, stray leaves or general upkeep are a concern, consider implementing some kind of employee plant policy so you know what’s being brought into the office. But no matter how you do it, you’re probably going to find an extra touch of nature around the office will brighten up the place, help clean the air and possibly even improve morale.

Plants also bolster productivity a bit, according to science, making them a win-win for employees and upper management alike. They’ll help rid your indoor air of pollutants, too, making them a potential substitute for electricity-hogging air purifiers and the like.

And, in addition to living plants in the workplace, let us echo the previous sentiments about bringing organic or repurposed materials into the office. Bamboo flooring is a sustainable choice, and reclaimed timber makes for excellent structural highlights throughout your office.

Rethinking Familiar Office Furnishings

Standing desks are far from a passing craze — they’re an answer to one of humankind’s oldest dilemmas: Our bodies are “designed” neither for sitting nor for slouching for long periods of time. In a world of imperfect compromises, ergonomic standing desks, rethought keyboards and mice and monitor risers were all designed to make our workplaces and offices a touch more comfortable — and healthy.

Since sprains and strains account for 38% of workplace injuries, those ergonomic office accessories are more than a trendy purchase — they’re actually helping to keep your workers safe and secure. Carpal tunnel syndrome is nobody’s favorite interloper, and such afflictions can eat into productivity in a hurry.

Furniture isn’t the only office furnishing getting a reboot under millennial stewardship, either — they’re also getting serious about noise pollution. The headphone-clad generation understands better than their forebears that noises in the workplace eat into concentration and productivity.

As a result, more and more workplaces are trying to reduce their “noise footprint” by introducing soundproofing products and other dampeners, like tapestries, window treatments and more. A quieter work environment generally translates into a more productive workforce — a fact that has effectively put traditional office design on notice.

Millennials really are bringing about a sea of change in what our workplaces look like — not to mention what goes on there. Nobody’s saying you need to install a slide in your office, Google-style, but with a few neat compromises like the one above, you can make your office look and feel more like home and give your body something to be happy about while you’re at it.