Ever checked your calendar and see how your meetings are arranged? People arrange meeting with in person meetings before COVID-19. Nowadays, when we arrange meeting, we will check if it’s in-person meeting or on-line meeting. This trend has affected our office setup for meeting rooms and each worker’s working devices.
We see the increased needs for smaller meeting rooms that are equipped with simple Video Conference devices and full VC equipment in large meeting rooms. This means the office layout design nowadays should consider more of this type of meeting setup. Of relevant importance is that IT professionals will be involved early on to ensure the incorporation of VC devices and meeting screens. Large board rooms are seldomly used as some people are joining the meetings from on-line. This means some alternative uses of board room can be considered to make more efficient use of the space. It can be used as multi-purpose use including training, event, etc.
Each worker has laptop and headphones ready to meet anywhere in their choosing. This means more quiet spaces are required. Therefore most companies are incoporating phone booths for personal meeting up to 4 people meeting. Some people also choose to meet in coffee corner or informal meeting area in which they can feel more relaxed.
Steelcase has published a study reagarding this trend. See their full article here.