For eons now, businesses have embraced the opportunities to furnish their office to give off a corporate, elegant, and functional impression. However, it can lead them down the rabbit hole of tired designs, old design trends, and more. If there's anything that can save businesses from making grave design mistakes and keep their employees happy, it's sustainability.
Sustainable workplace designs have many compelling benefits, such as employee happiness, workplace retention, brand appreciation, reduced energy bills, connectivity with the environment, and more. A sustainable design can also help you use your existing space smartly, encourage employee communication, and devise new ways of working.
Since recent times have brought the importance of eco-friendly practices to the forefront on the global stage, many businesses are actively choosing to create a greener, more sustainable workplaces for their employees. Today, sustainability has become a significant component in the business world as more and more designers are choosing to create multi-functional, efficient, future-oriented sustainable workplace environments that cut waste, save energy, and enhance employees' quality of life.
What Is a Sustainable Workplace Design?
A sustainable workspace or workplace design is also known as an eco-friendly or environmentally conscious or responsible design. This design concept aims to reduce the overall ecological footprint of your workspace by focusing on elements that can reduce your energy bills and employing features and fixtures that welcome natural resources.
A well-designed, sustainable workplace can effectively benefit your employees as it will enhance their well-being, making them feel more comfortable and taken care of at their workplace. It will also improve their quality of life.
Sustainable workplace designs always have an eye on the future and are designed to promote optimal functionality, look aesthetically appealing, and encourage sustainability and durability across the board.
It is designed while keeping the negative environmental impact at bay and making a conscious effort to be more eco-friendly. Focusing on creating a greener space can even attract customers to follow suit and see your business in a favorable light.
Benefits of Sustainable Workplace Designs
Here are some compelling benefits of sustainable workplace designs:
Reduction in Energy Bills
There are multiple ways in which adopting a sustainable workplace can help you reduce your costs. However, the most significant cost reductions will be in energy bills. Since you will be using sustainable energy sources, it will increase the amount of natural light in your workspace and reduce artificial light.
If you invest in solar panels, you can certainly produce enough light to support your workplace. While they will be a bit expensive upfront, solar panels are a cost-effective solution in the long term. You can eventually generate enough electricity to even sell it.
Moreover, sustainable workplace designs can also incorporate adding insulation within external walls to preserve warmth, resulting in reduced bills. You can also install skylights to maximize the use of natural light and ensure appropriate ventilation.
You can use dimming systems, occupancy sensors, LED lighting, and glass walls to incorporate artificial lighting throughout your workplace. Another way to reduce your energy bills through sustainability is to invest in energy-efficient appliances, such as computers and refrigerators.
Sustainable Work Furniture
If you are going for a sustainable workplace design, you have to invest in top-quality eco-friendly work furniture. You can choose reclaimed and recycled materials that will certainly be more affordable than brand-new office furniture.
Alternatively, you can shop consciously and focus on sustainability and your employees' health by acquiring premium quality Kana Bamboo Standing Desk and ergonomic chairs that will last a long time. After all, sustainability isn't just about buying recycled or upcycled products. You should also shop for products that can last a long time to ensure that you have a low carbon footprint and you don't add more products to a landfill.
You can do your research and find manufacturers who use eco-friendly materials to produce their furniture. Make sure to choose sustainable workplace furniture that is designed and manufactured consciously and does not use non-toxic paints or materials that leave a huge carbon footprint.
You can also find manufacturers who produce bespoke upcycled furniture. If you are a smaller firm, you can upcycle some old furniture yourself so that you have sustainable, distinct furniture throughout your workspace.
Connectivity with the Environment
You can transform your office into a healthy space by carefully researching and incorporating green design elements. A significant trend in sustainable workplace designs is that of biophilic design. Since work demands you to be indoors for most of the day, you should find ways to increase your employees' connection to the natural environment. Creating greener workspaces will help them feel relaxed.
Moreover, planting more shades outside your building will protect it from the scorching heat during the summer, reducing the need for air conditioning. Indoor plants can also improve indoor air quality.
Enhanced Brand Reputation
Research shows that customers are 80% more likely to purchase from brands that are environmentally conscious. Adopting a sustainable office design will send a strong message to your employees and customers who are environmentally conscious.
They will know that you are also serious about preserving the environment and adopting a sustainable way of life to make the world a better, safer place. Environmentally responsible companies gain an edge over their competitors and attract more customers and talent to their doorstep.
Even job hunters choose a company that cares about the environment and its employees. If you adopt sustainability, they will know that you are not just about serving your product or making money.
Having a sustainable workplace design can effectively help you attract the finest talent and save money on salaries since 40% of millennials choose one job over the other based on their sustainability values. Moreover, 30% even leave their jobs because their workplace didn't adopt sustainable practices, and 75% say that they can take a pay cut if the company they work for focuses on sustainability.
Boosted Employee satisfaction and Wellbeing
Stress is inarguably one of the biggest negatives in a workplace, and it affects an employee's overall health. However, a sustainable workplace design can effectively improve employee well-being and satisfaction with the workplace.
By using sustainable practices, you can turn the place on its head to have a healthy environment with more natural light and clean air. The former has been proven to decrease headaches by up to 84% so it will definitely have a positive impact on your workers' well-being.
You can also increase staff morale and customer satisfaction levels. When your employees feel comfortable in your office, they will be less distracted, stressed out, and irritable. It will enable them to maintain their concentration, focus on their work, and be more effective at bringing more willing customers through your doors.
Greener offices also have the capability to improve the problem-solving, processing, decision-making, and general mental well-being of employees. Your sustainable workplace design can help your employees benefit from clarity of mind, fresh air, exposure to more natural elements, and so much more.
Superior Comfort
Thanks to sustainable, well-designed furniture, you can ensure your employees are comfortably seated at their work desks. You can invest in Kana Bamboo Standing Desks, ergonomic mesh chairs, monitor stands, and other eco-friendly and ergonomic furniture to ensure your employees' comfort and happiness, making them feel at ease at work.
It will also result in them feeling obliged to improve their performance, driving them to help their workplace achieve the business objectives with a renewed sense of ownership and motivation.
Decreased Absenteeism
When employees love coming to work and feel refreshed at their workplace and head home with enhanced well-being and excellent mental health, it keeps them from taking sick days. It reduces the instances of illness, which also impacts the overall productivity of the business. Moreover, when fewer and fewer people take days off, it allows you to save on prospective absenteeism costs.
Future-Oriented Designs
Another significant benefit of sustainable workplace designs is that well-thought-out designs are always future-oriented. Sustainable designs allow you to use your existing space smartly and organize furniture and related objects in a way that improves accessibility and promotes sustainable practices that will certainly influence newer employees and encourage them to experience a paradigm shift.
Sustainable designs instill the idea that the future is now and here, and we need to consciously keep global warming and its related consequences at bay in whatever capacity we can, including sustainably designed workplaces.
The Bottom Line
While you have learned about the benefits of sustainable workplace designs, it's important to remember that if you need your sustainable design to be effective, it should promote eco-friendly practices.
Moreover, there's never a one-size-fits-all approach to sustainability. You need to factor in your budget, current building conditions, access to sustainable furniture and resources, and other considerations before designing a sustainable workplace. But once you go green, you will never want to go back!
