Engagement in the Workplace

Alfred Schofield, Hugo Oftedal,Rishita Shah & Arabella Purwada

Engagement and Acknowledgement

Young professionals in the workplace

Engaging knowledge workers in the workplace

Evolution of Problem Statement

Previous Experiment

Classroom Scramble

Students at the back shifted towards the front, affected their engagement

Interaction undoubtedly went up, Professor Nathan Karst helped to confirm this analysis

Lessons learned:

Location and the task at hand impacts the ability to engage

New Classroom Arrangement

Interview and Analysis

We spoke to knowledge workers who experienced a

change in environment due to relocation:

Laurie Krigman - Finance Faculty

Matt Allen - Entrepreneurship Faculty

Caroline Daniels - Entrepreneurship Faculty

Ken Mattson - Career Development

Amy Blitz - Economics and Management Faculty

Small sample size and age group of the knowledge workers gave us only a gist of what impact relocation had on their engagement.

There were mixed responses to the relocation.

Relatively new professionals felt more accepted after the relocation.

People who have been working for a while thought that relocation either didn’t affect or negatively affected their engagement.

Higher engagement not necessarily meant higher productivity.

Emphasis on an open and well lit workspace

Relocation had more impact when workplace was drastically different, minor change didn’t impact much.(Eg: Building change, new location.)

Interview Analysis

Observation

Current Experiment Hollow Square

Proposed Solution

Redesign the workplace, emphasis on lighting and central placement of the boss

Would simplify engagement for knowledge workers, especially our target persona

Addressing several pain points discovered over the course of this project

Customization in regards to color, background noise and other activities

Future Considerations

How can it be implemented in an office setting?

How would people react in a working setting?

Try in different settings, possibly better viewed

People might enjoy customization of workplace more than engaging with workers, put emphasis on this aspect when observing future experiments

Increase point of view from outside of the LEAP team, receive observations from other participants