Abstract:
Collaboration, working with others to achieve a shared goal, is recognised as the driving force behind innovation (Oseland, Marmot, Swaffer & Ceneda, 2011). Working interdependently distributes the workload and diversity in thinking provides teams with the ability to formulate new ideas and solutions to problems beyond that which could be achieved individually (Oseland, 2012). Collaboration is a highly social activity that involves a series of behaviours where interaction is principally face-to-face, non-routine, frequent, iterative and often intensive (Heerwagen, Kampschroer, Powell & Loftness, 2004; Olson & Olson, 2000). The purpose of this research is to understand how workspace design and fit-out supports and constrains collaboration within and betweenteams in a multi-faceted organisation. The research question is "How can office design and fit-out support or constrain collaboration within-teams and between-teams in open-plan offices?" The project is a case study of a corporate company located in Auckland, New Zealand. The organisation relocated from an open-plan office with traditional cellular offices and cubicle-style workspaces to a contemporary open-plan office with fewer physical barriers. The study involved two business units with different core functions and customer bases, comprising multiple small teams with diverse skill sets. Data collection occurred over three stages within a twelve-month timeframe. Participant-observation and semistructured interviews were used to investigate employees' perceptions and experiences of collaboration in their old and new workplaces. The results show that the drivers for collaboration are the team characteristics associated with specialisation, the core knowledge base, market niche, customer base and skill sets, with different combinations performing as key drivers. Fundamental decisions about buildings, floor plates and business unit location impact collaboration behaviour. Workspace must be 'fit-for-purpose' and workplace strategies that support one type of team may not be productive for another. The study makes three main contributions to academic literature: (1) findings on workplace collaboration are from a within-team and between-team perspective in an open-plan office in a corporate setting in the context of the key drivers, adding to existing literature on workplace collaboration in open-plan office environments, with different drivers in other fields of knowledge and industry sectors; (2) provision of a comprehensive conceptual framework that matches different types of team to within and between-team collaboration with corresponding design and fit-out features; and (3) the identification of design principles that could be further developed to inform corporate real estate and facilities managers contemplating workplace change.