Food for thought - Knowledge workers’ use of space

Knowledge work is usually less tangible than manual work. This study investigates four categories of knowledge workers use of space at a Norwegian institution for research and higher education.The four categories of knowledge workers are advisors and case officers (administrators), and lecturers and researchers (faculty). Most advisors are outcome oriented and highly competent in process driven work, and may work across a number of different fields or organizational units. Case officers on are usually task oriented and highly skilled in one subject. Lecturers are both task and outcome oriented, particularly concerning their professional hobby horses, the number of students passing their exams and student evaluations of their teaching. Most researchers are outcome oriented, particularly concerning development of ideas, funding, research partners, and publications in highly ranked scientific journals. How do these four categories of knowledge workers use space and workstations at this particular workplace?This paper is based on a mixed methods approach. A survey with 947 respondents (850 with cell offices and 97 with workstations in flexible offices/landscapes) during then spring 2016 gave a good overview of the respondents’ use of offices, workstations and common areas at this Norwegian institution for research and higher education. This paper presents a follow-up study of findings in the 2016 survey.This paper investigates the use of two floors in buildings with flexible offices/landscapes and two floors in buildings with cell offices. One floor in the buildings with flexible offices are used by administrators (mostly advisors), the other floor is used by faculty (mostly researchers). In the buildings with cell offices, one floor is used by administrators (mostly case officers but also some advisors), the other floor is used by faculty (mostly lecturers and some researchers).The data collection is firstly based on measurement of the areas in question. Secondly, monitoring of the data traffic (activity) during the week (where and when the data traffic takes place). Thirdly, trough observations, to study what kind of facilities there are at the different areas and when the four categories of employees are present, and what kind of work they do. Finally, semi structured interviews with a sample of individuals in the four categories of employees, and one focus group interview with each of the four categories of employees.