Office Initiative

We use our knowledge to design better office space

In order to create cost-effective yet healthy, performance-enhancing working environments, the Office Initiative first  identifies the requirements people have of office buildings. It then goes on to develop methodological, organizational and technological solutions and finally validates and demonstrates the results. In the process, we search for answers to the following interdisciplinary questions:

• What does the office of tomorrow look like?
• How can an office be designed to meet people‘s needs?
• How must office space be equipped in order to be profitable and rented out a long-term basis?
• How should the interface between the building (investor) and interior fittings (user) be designed in order to create healthy and performance-enhancing workplaces?
• Which measures are needed to find a balance between the cost-effective use of space and the productivity of office workers?
• How can good levels of concentration and communication at the workplace be achieved at the same time?
• How can solutions be monetized?

We share our expertise and offer partners added value

Partners of the Office Initiative benefit through ideas for planning and processes, impulses for product features and market positions, as well as from a unique knowledge lead. We offer:

• three partner meetings per year, changing venues between partners each time
• comprehensive database with lectures on various topics prepared for members
• a knowledge lead gained through interdisciplinary research about performance-enhancing office space
• new impulses from research and practice regarding cost-effective concepts and innovative products for office real estate
• a direct cooperative exchange between all participants

17 million people are affected

Almost 20 percent of the population in Germany currently works in offices and people spend a large part of their lives there. This makes it all the more important to create a pleasant and healthy atmosphere.

Dissatisfaction, poor performance and illness are the result

Over the past decade, an average of 2.65 million square meters of office space have been sold very year in Germany. Despite building them in compliance with current standards, office properties often do not meet the needs of modern work requirements. This leads to a sensory overload, loss of privacy, distraction and stress. The consequences are dissatisfaction, more mistakes, poorer work results, increased sick rates and higher staff fluctuation.

Acoustics play a major role

Current international studies show that office users perceive acoustics as a particularly disruptive factor. »Low-level noise« is one cause of growing psychological stress in offices. The increasingly efficient use of space appears to be associated with a poorer work performance due to noise and stress. This problem cannot be solved by rigidly following valid guidelines and adhering to conventional office design.

Develop concepts

The first step is to comprehensively identify the use-dependent requirements of office workplaces, such as acoustics, indoor climate, indoor air quality, lighting and colors. This is done by carrying out surveys and measurements in existing properties, as well as by applying psychological and building physics methods in a specially-constructed “High Performance Indoor Environment” laboratory at Fraunhofer IBP. This step is flanked by scientific work on psychological measurement methodology.

How do factors such as speech intelligibility, relative humidity and light spectrum affect our well-being, objective performance and health? Which combined influences occur? For many types of buildings and rooms, concepts are created and established  that combine the health, well-being and performance aspects of office workers with the space, energy and resource efficiency of a property.

In parallel, Fraunhofer IBP works with the partners of the office initiative to develop planning tools and product solutions that meet the dynamic requirements of a modern working environment.

Mobilize the market

Since good acoustics or a pleasant indoor climate are not self-perpetuating, a continuous dialog with the market and its players is called for. This is achieved directly through appearances at trade fairs, conferences and through workshops for the customers of the partners of the initiative. Internet tools and mobile applications supplement these activities. Over the coming years, the »SPIN Bau« on the Fraunhofer Campus in Stuttgart, a new building for office and laboratory use, will enable initial findings to be implemented in prototypes and tried out and experienced in practice.

Media partnerships with a focus on architecture, interior design and real estate, as well as the Fraunhofer Marketing Department, support the Office Initiative. This enables the public to be addressed in a targeted manner.

Peer Review Publications

Congress articles