“United we stand; divided we fall” is usually a pretty good maxim to live by – but not always (every rule must have an exception), some things are best done solo. The pioneer hacking a living for his family out in the wilderness needed unity to survive but so called modern man finds division everywhere. He possibly lives on land that has been sub-divided, his employment will involve division of labor and his work place has probably been sub-divided into discreet working areas. More a case of “Unity helps us succeed while division strengthens our unity”.
This is very evident in today’s office environment. The employer has invested in a space large enough to house his entire workforce but he cannot simply lump them all in together inside one big space. A roiling mill at a steel plant needs a very large space in which to operate but, what about the management office, the purchasing department, the sales department, etc., etc? From manufacturing companies to service providers; all need to divide up the available working area into function based separate entities. Perhaps this is more so when looking at a company’s “office staff”.
There have been so called “experts” who promote the concept of huge, open plan offices where everyone mixes in and works together in a large open space. But, even then, some sort of system of Office Dividers is often required (if only to reduce chatting on company time between co-workers). For this, the dividers need only be a few feet high and do not reach from floor to ceiling – many think of these as nothing but “cattle pens”.
If asked, most office workers would say that they are not so keen on the “cattle pen” concept. They may say that they are still distracted by activities in adjacent “pens”; or, that their particular function within the organization requires them to have more privacy. What they don’t say is that they see themselves as important enough to warrant their own private office; i.e. – the status factor.
When the “boss” agrees, for whatever reason, with the staff’s requests to be housed in “offices” rather than “cubicles”, he will find the answer by simply realigning the boundaries of the “pens” and replacing some of their “fences” with floor to ceiling Office Dividers.
Office managers seeking to reorganize the employee work areas will find good ideas and lots of help at Office Dividers. The Space Plus company has all you need in their range of glass based doors and partition panels.
