Take a Tour

June Langhoff — Tue, 07 Aug 2007 17:54:47 -0400

Welcome to the New Ways of Working Network
We are an interactive network of organizational innovators - people who are transforming their work environment – or preparing to do so. We take an integrated approach to workplace change, combining corporate real estate, human resources, and information technology. Our members are an intriguing mix of experts from the fields of workspace design, technology and real estate/facilities. Plus, our organization is enriched by the contributions of respected academic researchers and knowledgeable consultants who participate in New WOW events and report preparation, sharing their insights and latest research.

Take a Tour
To gain an understanding of the rich resources available through the Network, we’ve designed a short tour of some of our features. Please click along.

Research
Experienced researchers review recent studies, interview experts, and prepare easy-to-digest synopses of best practices, latest trends, and useful metrics. Topics so far include:

Productivity in Remote Virtual Teams
Virtual Team Spaces
The Role of Place in a Distributed World
Environmental Sustainability Through New Ways of Working
Work Practices and Processes for New Ways of Workin
Intercultural Collaboration in Global Teams

Semi-Annual Symposia
NewWOW.net members and academic colleagues gather twice a year for free three-day symposia on topics of major interest. Each person attending is an expert on some aspect of new ways of working, so everyone contributes. Recent symposia themes were:

The Challenge of a Distributed World
Does Place Still Matter?
Sustainability Through New Ways of Working
Work Practices and Processes for New Ways of Working
Cultural Impacts on Distributed Work Practices

Click on Latest Symposia for more information.

Quarterly Roundtables (“Tertulias”)
Four times a year we gather to hear a distinguished thought leader present a single topic, followed by extensive informal discussion. Click on Latest Tertulia for descriptions of recent topics.

Access our e-Library
Gain unlimited access to the rapidly growing, proprietary, NewWOW.net e-library of research materials, and member discussions on topics of key interest. Click on Latest Library Publications to view a list of library documents, which range from whitepapers to research studies, presentations to podcasts.

Member-driven projects
One of the good surprises of the New Ways of Working Network is the spontaneous birth of projects by motivated members. Two efforts are underway:

Sustainability Calculator Project. The Calculator is a tool designed to understand the sustainability impacts of alternative ways of working – the combined impacts of globally distributed workgroups, meeting patterns, including air travel and commute patterns, and the efficiencies of workplace locations and design. The Calculator will be available only to NewWOW members.
Alternative Workplace Benchmark Survey. The Benchmarking team conducted an online survey of alternative workplace solutions adopted by major employers. A report of the results of the 2008 survey of 32 companies is available to members only.

Interact with Others for Immediate Feedback
Our website facilitates threaded discussions where members pose questions, share concerns, and alert others to useful information and tools. To keep the discourse lively, we broadcast questions and ideas to other members and colleagues. Click on Latest Discussions for a taste of recent NewWOW topics.

Stay Current with Weekly Updates
The Network conducts a constant scan of research, the Internet, media, and contributions from members to identify news that may be important to our members. Each week we send out a short synopsis of this news, with links so members can follow up stories of interest. Click Latest Newsletters for copies of our newsletter, NetWORK News.

Levels of Membership
There are several ways to participate in the Network. Membership levels include:

Distributed Membership: For organizations at a distance, electronic membership provides an opportunity to access the website and participate in videoconferences, but without attendance at symposia or tertulia. $1,000
Single-Seat Membership: The member company designates a single representative to participate in symposia, tertulia, receive weekly e-newsletters, and have full access to research reports and the web page. Three people may have access to the web site. $5,000.
Multiple-Seat Membership: The member company can designate up to three representatives to participate in symposia, tertulia, receive weekly e-newsletters and have full access to research reports and the web page. Ten people may have access to the web site. $10,000
Sponsor: The member company’s name is featured prominently on the NewWOW web page and research reports, the company can send multiple representatives to symposia and tertulia, NewWOW and the sponsor may jointly conduct events for sponsor’s clients. Unlimited access to the web site for sponsor’s employees. $30,000
Colleague: Colleagues are academics and members of small consultancies who possess exceptional expertise in an area of interest to NewWOW members. They receive the rights of membership in trade for active participation in symposia, participation on the web site, or sharing of papers or research findings.

Want to Learn More About NewWOW? Download our eBrochure, give us a call, or drop us a line to learn how your organization may benefit from participating in the Network. Please contact
Jim Creighton at 408-354-8001, or Jim.Creighton@newwow.net.

Additional Information Available
These PDFs are also available for download:

Annnouncing Symposium VI: Generation Y and the Workplace

June Langhoff — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 15:00:29 -0400

The theme of our next symposium will be Generation Y and the Workplace. It will feature a in-progress report from the OXYGENZ research team of Maria Puyabaraud of Johnson Controls, Kate North, Jay Brand, and Sally Augustin of Haworth, and Simon Russell of IDEA. The OXYGENZ reseearch seeks to understand how important the workplace is to attracting, recruiting and retaining Generational Y workers. The team created an engaging online survey which visually creates their ideal workplace and original way to get at this group. Go to www.oxygenz.com to take the survey.

The Symposium will take place January 25 - 28, 2009 in Palo Alto, California.

GSA Joins Network

June Langhoff — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 20:12:16 -0400

The U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) has joined NewWOW. GSA's representative to NewWOW is Kevin Powell, Director of Research, Office of Applied Science, GSA, Public Buildings Service.

Kevin’s group, the Office of Applied Science, currently has 20 Active Projects in three key research areas:

Adopt sustainability practices and high performance building strategies
Improve workplace effectiveness
Optimize building delivery, energy efficiency and operations.

Recent research: Intercultural Collaboration in Global Teams

June Langhoff — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 14:34:53 -0400

NewWOW commissioned a research paper, Intercultural Collaboration in Global Teams by Professors Pamela Hinds and Catherine Cramton. This paper was presented at the 5th NewWOW Symposium, held July 13-16 2008 in San Jose, CA> The authors describe the challenges and opportunities in intercultural collaboration and the impact of culture on best practices for globally distributed work teams. They provided a framework for thinking about cultural differences and intercultural collaboration in globally distributed teams. Read our introduction and download the document at: http://www.newwow.net/members/node/861

Symposium V

June Langhoff — Sat, 05 Apr 2008 14:19:29 -0400

NewWOW’s fifth symposium was held July 13 through July 16, 2008 in San Jose, California. We explored the impact of culture on best practices for distributed work groups. Our keynoter was Professor Pamela Hinds of Stanford University, who also wrote a research paper on the subject for the Symposium. Her research helped us understand how culture could affect perception and acceptance of distributed work practices, and by implication, whether different work practices would be needed when distant teams included people from different cultures.

In addition to panels, breakout sessions and deep discussions, the attendees were treated to a personal tour of Dr. Renate Fruchter's new PBL laboratory at Stanford University. PBL in this case stands for Problem-, Project-, Product-, Process-, and People-Based Learning. At the PBL Laboratory, multidisciplinary, geographically distributed teams work on projects.

The final day of the event was devoted to NewWOW committee reports and membership business. Three committees reported their project status. These were:

Sustainability Calculator Team Progress
Benchmarking Committee
CEO Guidebook Project

Nokia, Applied Materials, Cisco, RTKL & Stanford University Join Newwow Network

June Langhoff — Sat, 24 Nov 2007 20:38:37 -0500

NewWOW welcomes several new members in the network: Nokia, Applied Materials, Cisco Systems, RTKL and Stanford University.

Nokia

Applied Materials creates and commercializes the nanomanufacturing technology that helps produce virtually every semiconductor chip and flat panel displays in the world.

Cisco is currently developing a new workplace strategy for its engineering group that is “a radically different environment in which new ways of working are supported by a completely new system of work spaces.”

RTKL has had a long-standing practice of bringing together whatever expertise was needed for a project, no matter where in the world that expertise was located. As RTKL’s worldwide practice grows, RTKL is developing new ways of ensuring that expertise is available on projects whenever and however it is needed.

Stanford University's challenge is that they are outgrowing the Palo Alto, California campus and some of the business offices are going to have to move from the campus. Yet they want to preserve the sense of connectedness and identity with the campus. Eric Richert has been providing consultation on the transition.

April Tertulia - Strategies for Capturing Business in Integrated Workplace and Real Estate Project Markets

June Langhoff — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 22:27:06 -0400

Our spring Tertulia, on April 24, 2008 featured Michael Joroff, Senior Lecturer, MIT School of Architecture and Planning, Mattias Bergman, Principal of the Infrastructure Solutions Group and Anthony Townsend, Institute For The Future.

They reviewed their recent study, Strategies for Capturing Business in Integrated Workplace and Real Estate Project Markets. It examines approaches to provide services and products that integrate place, ICT and organizational behavior at the workplace and at large-scale real estate development projects. Redefining workplaces and real estate projects as integrated spaces and projects where technology and place become interwoven with organizational and personal behavior will require a substantial mind shift. Their paper explores the premise that this integration will transform the workplace and large-scale real estate projects and examines how this transformation will create new business opportunities. Their presentation was followed by an in-depth discussion with other experts from our Network.

The event took place simultaneously in New York City, Holland, Michigan and San Francisco, California. Remote access was also provided.

White Paper: Distributed Work Group Practices by Eric Richert

June Langhoff — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 15:50:38 -0400

Eric Richert, principal of 8 Corners Consulting and the former director of Sun Microsystem’s Open Work Practice, prepared a research paper that analyzes the work practices and success factors that managers and employees use to work at a distance. It aims to provide answers to the question: "What do we do  to make distributed work situations work well?”

Based on a review of a wide range of academic and practitioner literature, the paper identifies nine success factors that help create employee engagement, productivity, satisfaction, and the achievement of business objectives.

KEY CONCLUSIONS IN ERIC'S PAPER

Most of the work practices identified as essential for distributed work have been previously identified as recommended practices for management of any teams of knowledge workers.
The failure to use these practices results in much more serious consequences when the team is distributed
Collocated teams perform some of these tasks through informal socialization, but distributed teams must accomplish them explicitly with conscious team agreements
When teams have a mix of collocated and distributed members, the team should follow the practices associated with a distributed team.
Locally distributed teams can be/should be widely prevalent, given advantages over both collocated and globally distributed teams

NewWOW’s 4th Symposium, “Work Practices and Processes for New Ways of Working” was devoted to discussing the implications of Eric’s research. After Eric presented his study, the group explored the challenges posed by the enabling work practices and their implications for the design of organizations, technologies, and workplaces.

What do workplace studies say about workspace choice?

June Langhoff — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 22:48:12 -0400

What do workplace studies say about workspace choice?
A NewWOW member posted a study he co-authored on workplace environment and performance. It explored how distractions, workspace flexibility, and personal control of work environment influences perceived job performance, job satisfaction, group cohesiveness, and the tendency to work alone or in an enclosed area. The study prompted a spirited discussion among members.

An excerpt:

Question:

Answer: I think that at least we could hypothesize that just providing a variety of spaces without understanding some of the issues that you raised (why just this set of spaces is needed; why just this variety of spaces is needed; why they're located & configured the way they are; how people will use each of the spaces) results in wasted real estate and a waste of design resources & investment.

Comment: My work suggests that the idea of a choice of spaces works well functionally, that is, as a support for work. But people need a big nudge to get them to accept it. Until recently the choice of locations was limited by inflexible technology but as more companies go wireless and everyone has pagers or blackberries this can no longer be used as an excuse. The challenge I believe is a psychic one: how can people learn to see the whole space (floor, building, campus, whatever) as their 'own' territory, when they are used to identifying a personal workspace as 'their own'.

Comment: The best workplace space I experienced was an early pilot for our own organization. It consisted of a nice balance of cubes (with pairs open to each other), small private space for individual work, larger private space for individual work plus small meetings, and meeting space. It was a space that served about 30 people with about 20 seats plus conference rooms.

Comment: In our company [based in Europe], employees tend to build a "comfort zone." The zone can be either a single person bubble or it may be a team or a larger group of people in a space who resist all the changes in their environment but also all the changes in the way they work. … Change is something that most of us naturally resist. But changing is a process that you can´t stop if you want to be in businesses today. You just need to find the right incentives: effectiveness, innovations, new people around, new furniture, etc.

Comment: My first thought in this kind of a situation is to NOT "move" people in the sense that they lose their partial "ownership" of the place they find valuable. Instead, create a new kind of workplace that would be also available to all. This could be a drop-in or satellite location located to significantly reduce commute times (if that is a problem), and/or enable working from home some of the time and making that a formal part of work arrangement for some.

Comment: I think it's important to understand the psychology behind these employees' current reluctance to change. Is it a case of "misery loves company" and they're afraid that change may result in something even worse than what they have now? I believe that most "corporate changes"--at least those related to CRE and FM--involve a loss of privacy, a loss of space, a loss of storage, a loss of enclosure; these changes usually result in a perceived loss of personal control and a perceived loss of status and importance to the organization. These may be erroneous perceptions, but they're very real to employees.

For access to the entire conversation, see http://www.newwow.net/members/node/162