Avoiding collaboration in a collaborative building

What is it about?

We show that buildings incorporating open-plan layouts and central meeting areas do not always promote new collaborations as is commonly assumed. In the collaborative building we studied, employees rarely experienced the chance encounters (e.g. unplanned water cooler conversations) that are thought to promote new collaborations. Instead, they actively avoided these encounters by continuing to work with existing collaborators, socializing with existing colleagues at the exclusion of others, following organizational policies that discouraged collaboration and engaging in actions like wearing headphones and avoiding eye contact to minimize interactions with new people. A key implication of our research is that collaborative buildings are only likely to promote new collaboration when employees are motivated to seek out serendipitous encounters with potential new collaborators.

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Why is it important?

Although organizations often try to improve collaboration through the design of buildings, existing research shows that such buildings can sometimes hinder and sometimes promote collaboration. Our research addresses this puzzle by showing that employees who work in office spaces designed to foster interaction (e.g. open-plan offices) may actively avoid interacting with new people. In order to reap the benefits of collaborative buildings, organizations need to consider the motivations of individual employees and the organizational conditions that influence how employees use collaborative buildings.

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