Green Offices Boost Productivity: Study

A new study suggests that offices should invest in plants to boost staff productivity and make the workplace healthier and happier.

A census, conducted in 2000, revealed that American office-goers spend an average of 52 hours a week at their desks or work stations. Only when the company invests in the employees' health, does their productivity increase. In a latest study, researchers at the Cardiff University found that plants at office helps boost productivity.

Lean office is considered as a productive and successful concept, but the latest field study challenges the concept of lean offices stating that plant-enriched greener workplace makes the staff happier and more productive. They found that enriching a lean office with plants, helps increase employees' productivity by 15 percent.

Studies conducted earlier showed that plants help lower stress and boost the attention span as well as employees' well-being.  This is one of the early studies that show that plants in office can improve the well-being of employees and make them happier.

The researchers examined the impact of lean and green offices on the employees' perception on quality of air, level of concentration and workplace satisfaction. They also monitored the levels of productivity over the following months in two different commercial offices in the UK and the Netherlands.

"Our research suggests that investing in landscaping the office with plants will pay off through an increase in office workers' quality of life and productivity. Although previous laboratory research pointed in this direction, our research is, to our knowledge, the first to examine this in real offices, showing benefits over the long term. It directly challenges the widely accepted business philosophy that a lean office with clean desks is more productive," said lead researcher Marlon Nieuwenhuis, from the Cardiff University's School of Psychology.

At the end of the field study, they noticed that plants in offices not just enhance workplace satisfaction, but also significantly increase the levels of concentration and the perceived air quality.

The researchers found that office environment with live plants enhanced the employees' work engagement by making them physically, emotionally and cognitively involved at work.

Co-author Dr Craig Knight, from the University of Exeter, said, "Psychologically manipulating real workplaces and real jobs adds new depth to our understanding of what is right and what is wrong with existing workspace design and management. We are now developing a template for a genuinely smart office."

The finding is documented in Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied.