Going to work shouldn’t be a bad experience. There are bad days and good days and sometimes it can feel like the days last forever. The workplace should be a place where the workers enjoy coming. It should be a place where you want to make a difference and where you are appreciated. It shouldn’t be a forced experience and it shouldn’t feel like you just want to stay home and be in a casino online – it should feel like home instead.
So how does a workplace create that feeling? How do you make it so that the employees want to come to work and contribute to the project not only for the sake of the salary? It is not an easy job to pull off. It’s all about the environment and the culture of the company – read more on that further down the article.
Why is a great office environment great for the culture?
First, why should you create a good culture for the company? When it comes to company culture it is important to realize that even though the company hasn’t worked on attaching or creating a culture – it will always be present. Culture, in the corporate sense, is almost always unknown for the participants and it needs an outsider or an insider looking from the outside to realize that there are certain norms and rules that everyone follows – not because it is what is told but because that’s just how it always has been.
The culture is the underlying assumptions on how work should be done, how workers need to behave and how you deal with problems.
A good office environment is very important in creating a safe and sound culture, where the workers feel that they aren’t just there to work but to be a part of something bigger. By creating an environment that cultivates a certain culture, you can quickly see how the employees react to different scenarios. It is apparent always.
The culture is important and having a bad culture and bad environment can lead to a lot of stress cases depending how your culture is. Some strive under pressure but others tend to crumble.
Read more about how you can create a better culture by changing or implementing things into the environment further down.
Things to do with the office space
First, let’s look at what can be done with the actual physical space to create a better environment. This is the easy part but can do a lot of good for the employees. It doesn’t take a genius to know that when the office works and everything is working soundly and nothing is broken and out of the workers way – everything runs more smoothly. Furthermore, it is a small gesture to the employees from the management and leaders that they care about the things in the office. In other words, if everything is cleaned, fixed and not in the way – it shows that everyone minds and cares for the workplace.
A thing that helps a lot when it comes to improving the environment is lighting. Lighting the room the right way is simple, but effective. The best way to light a room is with natural lights. Natural lights have a psychological effect on human beings and work better than all the alternatives.
Next, it is almost always a good idea to create quiet spaces around the office. Phones are ringing, people are talking about work and some listen to the radio – there are a lot of noises in an office space. Creating quiet spaces where people can go to work in silence is one way to increase employee satisfaction and work rate.
It’s about creating a sense of belonging
Another way to create a good culture and environment is to create a sense of belonging – a sense of work family. It is not an easy task but it starts with the gestures and teambuilding.
When wanting a cohesive and great culture, you can try to implement an open-door policy. When the employees feel that they can always contact the leader or supervisor with problems and questions people are more likely to seek advice and work together.
Next, try to have teambuilding and shared experience in the office space. Nothing is out of order here. It can be a shared lunch once every week or it can be a ping pong tournament for all who want to play. By having something everyone can participate in and do together it can create a bond between the employees and by effect make them feel more at home in the workplace.
When that is achieved there are no limits and boundaries holding the culture down and you might see a spike in productivity and employee satisfaction.