Last spring, we spent a day talking to people on the street about their workplace. We wondered: What did they like about their office? What were the pain points? Did their workplace impact their overall health and well-being? Put on the spot, these good sports—knowledge workers on their commutes and lunch breaks—delivered unvarnished opinions.
“Remember when I talked about 1982?” said a gentleman on his break. “That’s where I work.” I chuckled, conjuring up the image of a soulless space, probably devoid of natural light. His use of “1982” needed no further explanation, underscoring just how much workplaces have progressed. After all, an office without social spaces, amenities, or options of where to work now seems as antiquated as Dilbert’s cube farm.
While not everything about workplace design has uniformly improved (cue the debate on the merits of the open office), companies today are leaning into employee well-being—and asking how we can design to support it. To participate in the widespread conversation, we created a video merging our interviews with our position on supporting workplace well-being through design.