The Work Between Us
The future is a constantly evolving moment, two steps ahead of wherever we are now. And yet by our every action we are constantly creating it, shaping it, steering ourselves and our world onto new paths. Our iterative living is an act of creation, as much an effort of work as any machine part or research paper.
So what is work? Where do we draw the lines that define our work, and how do we describe what we mean by “workplaces”? The bright light of change has shone on everything we know in the last two years. In that light we can see more clearly how what we define as workplace can either facilitate or hinder the healthy functioning of our human endeavors.
With the new age of technology, greater fluidity has led to amorphous workplaces – many can and do work from home, in the car, in parks, on vacation, almost anywhere we choose. Even before COVID, conversations questioning the primacy of the ‘office’ were in play, though they did not yet have the evidentiary success stories we have recently seen as global businesses pivoted to 100% remote without taking any real hits to productivity.
Moving to New Understandings
Our ideas of physical workplaces are deeply rooted in our historical identity as workers, and the culture of the workplace guides our social and economic realities. Our work is closely tied to how we see ourselves, and so the forms of the space we use are bulkheads of the status quo. In 2010, Van Meel, Martins, and Van Ree envisioned shifting those old cultural models through changes in our office spaces - “Culture is by definition deeply rooted and difficult to transform. Office design, however, can be a powerful tool or change agent in this process”.
They could not have imagined then how expansive our understanding of ‘office’ would become. Now, in our new digital reality, we must think beyond an understanding of people as cogs in a machine, beyond physical offices, naming work design as a leverage point, a place where we can apply pressure and create spaces for transformation.
“Does our work shape us, or do we shape our work?”
We now ask, “Does our work shape us, or do we shape our work?” The laws of cause and effect are subtly blurred in these transitional moments. We must look to the intention of change, to the world we are trying to build not just in our workplaces but in our homes and nations, in all of the places where the work of future building takes place. Virtual work forces us to expand traditional definitions and to call for new integrative forms of work to emerge. Our shift to hybrid and virtual work spaces must include conversations about emerging cultural and interpersonal possibilities, how we see and understand ourselves in relationship to our work and to each other. When we are not occupying the same physical spaces, the relational reality of what we do becomes a powerful naming of purpose.
“We must muscle out the space for imagination, for different dreams and bigger pictures. We must watch for every open window and be willing to jump into the moments that form new before our eyes. ”
A Mighty Task
Taking on such huge conceptual shifts, being present, engaged, and inspired in this time of monumental challenges to our ecology, society, and economy is a mighty task. It is one that requires bravery and yes, love. Confronting the stalwarts of Taylorism and those who want us all to ‘go back’ to work, being the voice in the wilderness of cubicle land reimagining the whole of our working world – these are things which will require a fierce determination and an unyielding sense of service to the common good.
We must muscle out the space for imagination, for different dreams and bigger pictures. We must watch for every open window and be willing to jump into the moments that form new before our eyes. Because, as Daniel Pink says, it is “our basic nature to be curious and self-directed”, we already have the capacity for wonder that will allow us to see past what has always been done into the space of what is possible.
The Potential to Transform
While we share a history of finite workspaces, assembly lines, and cubicle farms, the last few years have set our eyes firmly into the future, into what is possible, in a way that has the potential to transform all of our lives, both at work and on the street. At this time of transformation, when so much is happening in both the public and private sector that is geared towards real generational and systemic change, we must hold onto a new and deeper understanding of form and function, of work and society, and of the vastly complex relationships between what we build and who we become. It is up to each of us to create the eyes to see, the space to listen, and the bravery to jump in and make changes.
“It is up to each of us to create the eyes to see, the space to listen, and the bravery to jump in and make changes. ”
