How Outdated Design is Affecting Your Business Negatively 

How Outdated Design is Affecting Your Business Negatively

Many companies have been operating for years, sometimes decades, but their offices tend to become outdated rather quickly. A business's culture is reflected in its design. If shag, wallpaper, or calling secretaries babydoll is still commonplace where you work, it’s safe to say your company is quite disconnected from the times. That and there’s probably a number of HR nightmares waiting to happen. Attracting new talent, retaining millennials, and avoiding a negative impact on team motivation means updating your company design. Corporate culture goes a long way to building job satisfaction but only when that culture resonates with both current and future hires. Let’s take a more in-depth look at how outdated design will impact your business negatively.

Squeaky office chairs. Old coffee pots. Chipped and scuffed desks. Carpet peeling up at the corners of the rooms. You’d be surprised how such simple annoyances can quickly mutate into daily stress. Barabra in accounting may end up snapping one day because no one’s fixed the lunchroom door in the two years she’s been working there. Then, one day, it comes off the hinges and so does she. A clean, modern, updated office is like wearing fashionable, current clothing. It makes people feel good, relaxed and connected to the world around them. If your clothes are patchy, fraying, worn, and out of style, you don’t feel confident and ready to face the day. Your office space deserves the same annual freshening up as your wardrobe.

No one wants to struggle with using old equipment, refurbished technology, or a computer on its last legs. Productivity drops when team members feel like their efforts are not worth the results they’re reaching for. Out-dated technology and tools that slow down or halt someone’s productive streak are going to quickly suck the passion right out of your employees. Plus, it’s difficult to keep up with competitors when they’re on a motorcycle and you’re still riding around in a jalopy. Team motivation is key to a sustainable, flourishing business. You could lose valuable members and employees if they start feeling like what they are doing is hopeless. The easiest way to combat bitterness and pessimism from creeping into the office is to make sure they have everything they need to succeed.

Walking into a workplace every day that feels out of time or unkempt can be quite draining on staff. Their value as team members is tied to the perceived value of the business. If everything were shiny, new, and modern, they’d feel integral to the company, motivated to work, and that they are a contributing member of the team. When they walk into a place that doesn’t seem cared for they’re quickly going to feel like the company doesn’t care about them either.

Why can’t the company not buy new chairs or update the inventory management software? Is it doing well? Maybe they are not making the profits I thought they were when they hired me? I think I should start looking for something else…These are just some of the thoughts that will go through employee’s heads if your company design and culture are kept up-to-date. A lack of investments coming into the business is a real possibility if it’s outdated and it won’t take long for doubt and fear to bubble up across the team when growth is stifled. A long-term future means embracing the future, not clinging to the past with desperate, white-knuckled fingers.

By 2020, nearly half of the workforce will be millennials - individuals between the ages twenty-two and thirty-six - and they continue to change corporate culture. Office design that doesn’t reflect their values, their independent nature, and their technological prowess are going to turn them off. Your business needs to be as progressive as this growing workforce. Otherwise, your teams will stagnate alongside your company.