Create a Cosy Office and Increase Productivity

Do worries about the level of productivity in your workplace keep you up at night? Are you permanently frustrated that all the motivation seminars, training courses, expert agencies and self-help guides seem to have made no difference whatsoever? Have you reached the point where you’re considering laying people off because you just can’t seem to get them to work to their full potential?

Have you considered turning the heating up?

It might sound like an overly simple fix to a very complicated problem but it could be the answer to all of your prayers. And this isn’t just one person, there’s actual research to back this up.

But before we get to that, let’s have a look at the damage that a cold office can do.

Firstly, the word ‘cold’ is so closely associated with the word miserable that weather reports all around the world regularly use the phrase “cold and miserable”. That they go so well together means that you almost can’t hear one without hearing the other so our brains are conditioned that if we are cold, we are miserable. Don’t believe us? When was the last time you were cold and happy? And of course, when somebody is miserable, their work will suffer.

The temperature level can also be directly responsible for bouts of sickness. Most bugs and viruses thrive in bodies with low defences and when the body is working hard to heat itself, it is more vulnerable to attack. We all know about the domino effect; once one person is sick, it’s bound to spread around the office and before long, half of your staff are tucked up at home.

It isn’t necessarily your fault that the office is cold. Many offices are housed in old, redesigned buildings which are prone to draughts or high humidity. Heating systems are almost never designed with an office plan in mind so quite often you find one half of the office is boiling while the other is freezing. Then there is the cost of running and maintaining a boiler.

Portable heating hire could be the solution to many of your problems. To begin with, the cost of hiring heating systems is seasonal and so can be rationalised over the year’s budget. You also get the benefit of the flexibility of moving the heating devices from one place to another to heat sections of the office as and when they need it.

By increasing the temperature of the office by just a few degrees, to a comfortable level, you will see the mood lift, motivation increase and productivity rise to impressive levels. You should also find your sickness record improves and, most importantly of all, you will sleep better at night.

Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/danielwilliams/3599460929/