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Innovative companies do not simply require more days in the office. In Gensler’s 2022 U.S. Workplace Survey, the employees classified in the top quartile of an Innovation Index reported a different combination of work modes and workplace choices: more collaboration, learning and social activity; easier access to several kinds of spaces; and a desire to spend more time at the company office than they were actually spending.
Those findings describe an association in survey responses, not proof that a particular fit-out creates innovation. For construction and workplace teams, the useful lesson is to design for the activities people need to do together, alone and in between—not to copy a fashionable room type.
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What the survey means by “most innovative”
The findings come from Gensler’s U.S. Workplace Survey 2022, which polled more than 2,000 U.S. office workers. Janet Pogue McLaurin reported the results in a Gensler article published May 17, 2023; Building Design + Construction republished it on April 15, 2024. The source article is available at Gensler and the republication at Building Design + Construction.
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That distinction matters for anyone turning the findings into a building brief. The survey identifies patterns associated with higher perceived innovation. It does not establish that adding a game room, increasing office attendance or buying a particular piece of furniture will cause an organization to innovate.
1. Innovators spend less time working alone
The top-quartile group reported a work pattern with more interaction and less isolation than the bottom-quartile group. Gensler says the most innovative respondents spent more time working with others virtually, learning and socializing. Their reported learning time was almost double that of the least innovative group. The accessible article does not provide exact percentages for each work mode, so the comparison should remain qualitative rather than being converted into invented figures.
What “working with others” includes
The comparison is broader than a traditional meeting schedule. It includes in-person collaboration as well as virtual collaboration, structured learning and informal social contact. A team may therefore need a mix of project rooms, video-enabled settings, teaching areas and places where unplanned conversations can happen. Treating every non-desk activity as a meeting misses the learning and social dimensions in the survey.
Why the learning result is significant
Almost twice as much learning time is a relative finding between the two survey groups, not a measured number of hours for every employee. It nevertheless points to a planning question: where can people teach one another, observe work, test an idea and receive feedback? If a project provides only assigned desks and a large boardroom, those activities have no obvious home.
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Construction implications
During programming, map the recurring activities rather than starting with a target number of desks. Ask project leaders how often teams need confidential coaching, demonstrations, peer review, remote participation and informal conversation. Then place the required settings along a convenient circulation route so that collaboration does not depend on booking the largest room in the building.
- Provide a range of room sizes for short discussions, workshops and longer project sessions.
- Specify reliable cameras, microphones, displays and acoustic treatment where remote colleagues must participate.
- Include writable surfaces and reconfigurable furniture for teaching, critique and experimentation.
- Protect some unprogrammed areas for brief conversations instead of assigning every square metre to a scheduled use.
2. A wider choice of spaces makes work easier
Top-quartile respondents said it was easier to find settings for focused concentration, informal or confidential conversations and video conferences. They were almost three times as likely as the comparison group to say it was easy to find a place to relax, recharge or take a break. Gensler also described them as approximately three times as likely to have a broad range of individual spaces, group spaces and restorative spaces.
These are reported likelihood ratios, not exact room counts or utilization rates. The survey text does not say that every innovative company had the same floor plan, nor does it identify a minimum number of rooms. The practical point is choice: employees could match the setting to the task without improvising in a corridor or occupying a room designed for another purpose.
Individual settings
Individual settings include quiet zones and focus rooms. They support concentrated work, sensitive calls and recovery from a busy team environment. In a construction brief, define the performance requirement—speech privacy, visual separation, power, lighting control and ventilation—before selecting a product. An optional office privacy room divider can separate a focus area in an existing layout, but it is a space-planning option, not a feature named or evaluated by Gensler.
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Group settings
Group settings include what Gensler calls innovation hubs, along with rooms that support project work and review. Their value is not the label on the door; it is the ability to bring people, materials and information together. Confirm floor loading, electrical distribution, display locations, furniture storage and sightlines during design so that a supposedly flexible room can actually change configuration.
Restorative settings
Restorative settings include examples such as game rooms or nap spaces. A project does not have to reproduce those exact amenities. It does need to decide whether employees have a legitimate place to pause, decompress or reset without taking a conference room out of service. Consider acoustic separation, cleaning, accessibility, supervision and the cultural expectations around using the space.
Access matters as much as inventory
Having rooms on a plan is different from making them easy to use. Test the route from work neighborhoods, the visibility of room availability, booking rules and the time required to find an alternative when a room is occupied. The survey asked whether spaces were easy to find, so operational access belongs in the design conversation alongside area and finishes.
3. Innovators wanted more office time than they were getting
The survey’s attendance figures are easy to misread because they answer two different questions. In 2022, the top-quartile group reported spending 46% of its work week at the company office. The average respondent reported 51%. Yet the top-quartile group said it would prefer to spend 67% of the week at the office to maximize individual and team productivity.
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| Measure | Most innovative group | Reference point | What it represents |
|---|---|---|---|
| Actual office time, 2022 | 46% of the work week | 51% average respondent | Reported time spent at the company office during the survey period |
| Preferred office time, 2022 | 67% of the work week | Not stated for the average respondent in the cited text | Share of the week respondents said would maximize individual and team productivity |
The gap between 46% actual and 67% desired time should not be presented as a mandate to require five days in the office. It says that this group perceived value in being together more often than its current pattern allowed. Whether attendance rises depends on the work, management practices, commute, technology and the quality of the workplace provided.
How the historical figures fit
Gensler’s historical workplace research, reported in the 2023 article, puts the innovators’ typical office time at 74% in 2016, 72% in 2019 and 67% in 2020. Each number belongs to its own survey period; they are not a continuous measurement of the same individuals.
| Survey period | Innovators’ reported office share | Qualification |
|---|---|---|
| 2016 | 74% | Historical Gensler workplace research |
| 2019 | 72% | Historical Gensler workplace research |
| 2020 | 67% | Historical Gensler workplace research |
The series suggests that office time was already changing before the 2022 results, but it cannot explain why. Do not combine the historical percentages with the 2022 actual and preferred measures as though they were one controlled time series.
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A useful brief translates the survey’s activity patterns into observable requirements. It does not specify “an innovative office” as a finish package. Use the following sequence with the client, design team and facilities lead.
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- Define the work to be supported. List concentration, confidential conversations, project collaboration, virtual participation, learning, social connection and recovery. Identify which activities are individual, paired, small-group or large-group.
- Map when and where each activity occurs. Ask teams about peak periods, neighborhood adjacencies, equipment, storage and noise tolerance. Separate a room that must be reserved from a setting that should remain available for short, spontaneous use.
- Set performance criteria before selecting products. Write requirements for acoustic privacy, sightlines, lighting, power, data, ventilation, accessibility, cleanability and reconfiguration. This prevents a visually appealing room from failing its actual use.
- Plan a distributed mix of settings. Place focus, conversation, video, learning, group and restorative options near the people who use them. A single amenity zone at the end of a floor may technically satisfy a program while remaining inconvenient.
- Coordinate technology and building systems early. Video rooms need suitable acoustics, camera angles, display positions, glare control, network capacity and commissioning. Flexible rooms need enough power and furniture storage to change layout safely.
- Design the operating rules with the building. Decide how rooms are booked, how long they can be held, who resets furniture and how employees find an available alternative. Easy access was part of the reported difference, so policy can undermine a well-designed plan.
- Measure outcomes after occupancy. Track availability, observed use, user satisfaction, privacy complaints, technology reliability and the ability to support learning and collaboration. Treat those measures as feedback for adjustment, not as proof that a room caused innovation.
A decision framework for owners and project teams
| If the client’s problem is… | Investigate first | Possible design response | Do not assume |
|---|---|---|---|
| People cannot concentrate or hold sensitive calls | Noise paths, visual interruptions, room availability and booking friction | Quiet zones, enclosed focus rooms, acoustic upgrades and clearer access rules | That more open desk area will solve privacy |
| Hybrid meetings are frustrating | Room acoustics, camera and microphone coverage, display sightlines and network performance | Right-sized video rooms with commissioning and alternate collaboration settings | That installing a screen alone creates equitable participation |
| Learning happens informally or not at all | Where demonstrations, coaching and peer review currently occur | Teaching-capable rooms, writable surfaces, movable furniture and nearby storage | That a branded “innovation hub” guarantees new ideas |
| Employees leave the workplace to recover | Whether a quiet, acceptable break setting exists and can be reached easily | Restorative areas with appropriate privacy, acoustics, cleaning and accessibility | That a game room suits every workforce or culture |
| Attendance is lower than the client expects | Which tasks employees believe are better in person and what the current workplace lacks | Improve the settings that support team productivity, learning and connection | That attendance targets by themselves demonstrate workplace effectiveness |
Limits a responsible reader should keep in view
- The population was more than 2,000 U.S. office workers surveyed in 2022. The findings should not automatically be generalized to every country, industry, job type or construction project.
- The top and bottom groups were quartiles of a perception-based index. They are not independently audited rankings of “innovative companies.”
- The article reports associations between perceived innovation, workplace conditions and work patterns. It does not prove that a room type, furniture system or attendance policy caused innovation.
- Several comparisons are expressed as “almost” or “approximately” two- or three-times differences. Exact underlying percentages are not provided in the accessible text, so greater precision would be misleading.
- The actual and desired office percentages measure different things. A preferred share is not an attendance record, and the historical figures come from different survey periods.
- The source text does not provide enough information here to evaluate every sampling, response or weighting method. Use the results as directional evidence alongside the client’s own observation and post-occupancy data.
How to use the evidence without copying a template
McLaurin wrote that “The creative process requires both time and access to physical spaces to ideate, bounce ideas off colleagues, incubate, collaborate, experiment, and refine new ideas that bring value to a company.” That description is useful because it treats innovation as a sequence of activities, not a room name. A construction team can therefore ask which moments require proximity, which require quiet, which need remote participation and which benefit from an informal pause.
Start with the organization’s actual work and test the plan with representative users. If a laboratory team needs secure review space, its requirements will differ from a professional-services team that needs frequent client video calls. If employees are expected to come in for collaboration, the workplace must make collaboration materially easier than working alone at home. If the reason to come in is learning, the building needs places and practices that support learning rather than simply more unassigned desks.
The survey’s strongest message is not “build more amenities.” It is that the highest-scoring respondents experienced a workplace with more ways to work and reported wanting meaningful time there. A well-briefed project makes those choices visible, accessible and technically dependable, then checks whether occupants can actually use them.
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