Plan&Visualize Office Design Reinvented

White Paper

Office Design Reinvented: How to

Increase Productivity using PlanEasy2D
Plan&Visualize Office Design Reinvented

Executive Summary

Designing a plan for a brand new office and redesigning for an existing
office involve different considerations and inputs. The main goal is however
the same: maximize productivity and cost efficiency. A well-designed office
can reap the benefits of smart,worker-oriented designs. Simple concepts
applied in the design/redesign can reduce time and cost immensely. A
floorplanner tool visualizes the solution for you and helps determine the
best options with less effort and within a short period. This paper explains
the steps involved in planning a new office and the role PlanEasy2D plays in
making optimal decisions. Also discussed is a case of how a proposed
rearrangement of office employees can be examined within a few minutes,
again helping in crucial decision-making.

Planning a new office

When a company decides to go for a new office, it can either construct the building
from scratch or think of renting a building that suits its operations. Although there is
more work and time invested in the former, both require a good amount of
organization and interior decoration effort. Each floor of an office building needs to
be designed according to its purpose and the employees who will be working there.
The functionality of the rooms influences the choices made in drawing up a suitable
plan. Different types of companies need distinct layouts to fit their operations. If we
take the case of a software design company that would need to accommodate 20
computer engineers in one floor along with a group leader, the arrangement would
be different from the case where a newspaper publisher looks for an office to
accommodate its employees.

A company building requires an assortment of space types. These can include:

Core Working Space

1. Individual/joint work space for staff: Two types of organization are possible
here – open office and cubicle type
2. Conference rooms

Employee/Visitor Support
1. Lobby
2. Atria or Common area
3. Cafeteria or dining hall
4. Physical fitness area

Operation and Maintenance

1. General Storage
2. Computer Closets
Plan&Visualize Office Design Reinvented

After the space type, more detailed aspects of interior planning come into the
picture:

• Furniture planning – deciding on the type, numbers, dimensions and

placement
• Windows – In the case where the planning is for the construction of a new
building, windows are important for adequate natural lighting.
• Lighting Arrangements – To supplement the natural light in the rooms,
suitable artificial lights should be provided for.
• Flooring – Decisions on what type of tiles to be used for the floors and if full
or partial carpeting is needed should be made.
• Heating System/Electrical Outlets on Walls – Depending on the climate of the
region where the office is located, heaters may be necessary along the walls.
Electrical outlets need to be placed at the appropriate points as well.

The following points ponder are useful to ponder for making decisions on
the above mentioned facets of planning:

 Spatial equity: Do workers have enough space to accomplish tasks?

 Flexibility: Can the workplace be rapidly adjusted to respond to industry-
related challenges?
 Comfort: Can workers adjust light, temperature, furnishings, and acoustic
levels to their preferences?
 Sense of place: Does the workplace decor and atmosphere mirror the
company’s brand or mission? Does the workplace create a culture appropriate
to the work done there?

Company A wants to start a branch in a new city to

expand its operations. An existing office building offered
for rent is identified as a potential location. One or more
of its floors may be needed to house the employees and
operations. To confirm its suitability and estimate space requirements, a plan needs
to be drawn visualizing the office with furniture and other arrangements in place.

Requirements for the office:

• Number of Employees = 25 (20 developmental + 3 administrative + 2 sales)

• Cubicle-type workplace for developmental personnel and open-type for
administrative and sales
• Conference room required on one or more of the floors
• Kitchen /Dining Space
• Computer storage space

Using PlanEasy2D to create the plan:

Floors 2 and 3 of the building are being considered. The best solution for the
company is accommodating all the employees, conference room, kitchen and
Plan&Visualize Office Design Reinvented

computer storage room in a single floor. The dimensions and layout of the rooms in
the floors are known.

Let’s start with Floor 2:

Step 1: Draw the rooms in the floor as per the layout with the appropriate
dimensions. The mens/ladies restrooms for the floor are already in the plan. Here
you can choose between displaying the dimensions in feet or meters according to the
standard used.

Fig 1. Layout of the floor with dimensions

Step 2: The workplaces of the staff can now be added to the plan by using the
suitable furniture symbols from the office library. Since the cubicle-style is preferred
here for a portion of the employees, the cubicle symbol is inserted at the appropriate
places in the main hall. By right-clicking, the dimensions of the cubicle can be
adjusted and also rotated to the desired position. Once adjusted, furniture can be
copied and pasted in the preferred location in the room. Other furniture such as book
shelves and work desks can also be inserted in place.

Step 3: Deciding on other rooms – As a trial, the lower left-hand corner room is
selected as the conference room and the right-hand corner room as the kitchen.
Only the computer storage space remains to be allocated. With the corresponding
furniture, you can get an idea of whether the space is adequate.

Step 4: Any remaining furniture items can be selected from other libraries (eg.,
plant,drawer,etc.) and put in place. Now, you have an exact estimate of how many
staff can be accommodated in the floor and if all the requirements have been met for
the other rooms.
Plan&Visualize Office Design Reinvented

Fig 2. Plan with cubicles added

Fig 3. Final Plan of Floor 2

As we can see, with the planned estimates of cubicle and table sizes, even with a
frugal placement, Floor 2 can accommodate only 20 employees. The remaining 5
cannot be comfortably seated in the same floor. Either another arrangement
including Floor 3 must be considered, or another office building where an optimal
arrangement would be possible needs to be found.

These steps show you how within a span of one hour at a maximum, you can
determine the suitability of the choice of floors and/or building for your new office
and thus save valuable time and cost using PlanEasy2D.
Plan&Visualize Office Design Reinvented

New Ideas in Office Design

Architects and designers constantly reexamine the changing workplace to solve

problems and accommodate needs. Some of their innovations have played better
than others. Here’s the latest thinking on what works:

• For better worker retention and productivity

Executive offices on the interior, workers at the windows

Executive offices are better placed at the center of each floor. Rank-and-file workers
who spend more time at their desks belong in open spaces by the windows where
they can benefit more from the views and natural light.

• If your goal is spontaneous collaboration

Enclosed mini-conference rooms

When collaborative areas are scattered between clusters of cubes, the noise prevents
cube-dwellers from getting work done. Instead, allocate small spaces with doors for
informal meetings. Workers can quickly come together without having to leave their
immediate area or reserve a conference room.

• To get a more mobile workforce

Satellite and drop-in office spaces

Employees who spend a lot of time at other sites do not need fixed-size office space.
Making offices smaller allows for “touch-down” or “hotel” workspaces for visitors
from other offices.

• If your goal is balancing privacy with collaboration:

Lower cube walls

Traditional cubes are too isolating, but the “open desk” system can be disturbing and
directly affect the productivity of employees. Companies can simply lower cube walls
from six feet to four, affording just enough privacy and plenty of visibility.
Plan&Visualize Office Design Reinvented

Redesigning an existing office

Redesign may be necessary for a variety of reasons – it could be existing space

issues that need to be solved or simply to improve the motivation of the employees.
It is important in keeping up with the current pace and face of the organization. As
the company grows and changes, newer problems come up which can be tackled by
innovating or reinventing the office space. Feedback from employees and customers
plays a major role in the analysis.

Assess Current Space Layout and Usage

Study whether the layout of the building is helping or hindering employees in the
quest to get work done. Observing workers for a few days will reveal inefficient
organization of space.

Bad signs:

• Collaborative spaces are bunched at the far end of the building

• People whose jobs are highly collaborative do not naturally come into contact
with colleagues during the workday
• Employees spend a lot of time in transit to meeting rooms, printers, copiers,
and fax machines

Find out how often people are using existing spaces by monitoring cubicles and
conference rooms periodically.

Bad signs:

• An area is always empty

• An area is overcrowded
• Workers are competing for certain furnishings or equipment and not using
others

Company B has found that a long-term project with a

particular customer is proceeding at a slow rate.
Upon observing the process of operations, it has
found that the problem lay with the physical location
of workers of three departments that needed to
interact with each other many times a day. Two of the departments needed access to
a laboratory that was located in another building. The solution is obvious: to
reorganize them to minimize time lost in going back and forth between two buildings
and also in meeting each other. But to visualize the new arrangement and confirm its
viability, a plan is drawn with color-coding to indicate how employees in the project
are physically distributed.
 Plan&Visualize Office Design Reinvented

Using PlanEasy2D to create the plan:

Figure 4 shows a diagram of the buildings, B1 and B2, and the departments in the
different floors:
Building Floor Department(s) Number of
Employees
B1 2 1 5
2 2
5 3 8
B2 Ground Laboratory

A total of 8 workers from dept. 1 and 3 require access to the lab.

B1 B2

Floor 5 Dept. 3

Floor 2 Dept. 1 Dept. 2

Laboratory

Fig. 4. Building Layout

Solution:

As the laboratory cannot be moved, the proposal is to move the employees who
need access to it from building B1 to B2, preferably in the ground floor of B2 where
there are a few vacant spaces. The two employees from dept. 2 of B1 and remaining
five employees from the other group can be accommodated in the first floor of B2, as
illustrated below.

Step 1: Draw the rooms in the ground floor of B2 as per the current layout with the
appropriate dimensions and work space arrangement.

Fig. 5. B2 Ground Floor Layout

Step 2: Decide on the seating arrangement for the 8 employees that need access to
the lab. The red squares drawn using the text box indicate that employees belonging
to dept. 1 will be seated in the respective desks.
Plan&Visualize Office Design Reinvented

Fig.6. Layout with Color-Coding to indicate new Employee Distribution

Step 3: Draw the rooms in the first floor of B2 as per the layout similar to how the
ground floor was drawn.

Fig. 7. B2 First Floor Layout

Step 4: Decide on the optimal seating arrangement for the seven employees, such
that they can collaborate with each other easily.
Plan&Visualize Office Design Reinvented

Fig. 8. Layout with Color-Coding

In this example, we have seen how a proposed rearrangement of office employees

can be confirmed and simultaneously documented with an easy color-coding scheme.
In the first floor of B2, curved work desks were tried out in place of the rectangular
desks corresponding to the requirements of the respective employees. Thus,
flexibility to experiment with the planning is possible using PlanEasy2D.
Plan&Visualize Office Design Reinvented

Points to Take-Away

Designing a productive office building is a matter of using the right inputs and tools
to experiment with. A software tool like PlanEasy2D that is simple to use, offers
flexibility and supports a wide array of applications, can make a big difference in the
way design/redesign projects are executed. The following points summarize the
advantages of using PlanEasy2D:

1. Cost vs Feature: For the low investment made in the software, you get all
the features needed to plan your space
2. Learn as you draw: The tool has a very small learning curve and can be
used by non-CAD people
3. Real-time feedback: With real-time feedback, improvements can be
immediately tried out
4. It helps both large and small-sized companies in planning their space
5. Using the software you can communicate your ideas to architects and interior
designers.
6. Map of your office space: Use PlanEasy2D to create a current map of the
office space and as you grow, modify and visualize new arrangements.
Plan&Visualize Office Design Reinvented

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