Since it’s invention, the office has changed in both appearance and form.

From a humble briefcase to the walled in think-tank of today, here is quick look at the adapting needs of the office.

In its early day, the office was a place of work, where mostly women worked in a shared space, with the incessant clacking of typewriter keys.

In the years following World War II, Friedman wrote that most offices “… consisted of a vast open space, with rows and rows of identical desks crammed tightly together.”

(The diminishing size of the cubicle didn’t help its plummeting popularity. The average cubicle shrunk between 25% and 50% in size between the mid-1980s and mid-1990s, according to The Washington Post).

Friedman described the open office as more “egalitarian,” in theory, but also rife with problems. “While open office designs may increase communication between colleagues, they often do so at a cost to individual work,” he wrote.

However, as most modern day employees know, it’s one thing for an organisation in 2018 to slap buzzwords like collaboration, egalitarianism, and teamwork on its office walls and website.

It’s another thing entirely to run a business based on such principles.

Today, the office can work within the confines of a wall or be productive without this constraint.

Andrea 

TempDirect