Open-plan offices and collaboration
Page 1
Cognition in context: How open-plan offices can help or harm collaboration
We will present a qualitative field study conducted in the context of a new building in
Australia, which we will refer to as the “Collaborative Science Building”. The building was
intended help to promote collaboration and productivity among the scientists and administrative
personnel who worked there. We focus on the physical arrangement of the building, specifically
the open-plan offices. Open-plan offices are a shared space where desks are freely arranged in
groups and where there are no walls and minimal barriers between desks (Bodin-Danielsson &
Bodin, 2008). The lack of barriers in open-plan offices should promote collaboration because
employees have easy access to their colleagues (Zahn, 1991). Empirical research supporting this
idea has been inconsistent, however, with some researchers reporting that open-plan offices
promote distractions, reduce privacy, and result in lower productivity than closed-plan (or cell)
offices (e.g., De Croon, Sluiter, Kuijer, & Frings-Dresen, 2005). To better understand the drivers
of collaborative behavior in open-plan offices, we analyzed interview and observational data
collected over a period of six weeks.
Collaboration involves assigning task responsibilities, sharing information and providing
help with a view to progressing work tasks (Rousseau, Aube, & Savoie, 2006). In assessing the
influence of open-plan offices on collaboration, researchers need to weigh up the benefits that
employees gain from working in open-plan offices (e.g. easier access to colleagues) that
typically promote collaboration (Boutellier, Ullman, Schreiber, & Naef, 2008), and the negatives
(e.g. distractions and interruptions) that can undermine individual concentration (Roper &
Juneja, 2008). To address this problem, we developed the research question: Under what
conditions do open-plan offices promote (and inhibit) collaboration among employees?
Open-plan offices and collaboration
Page 2
To answer this question, we drew upon situated cognition theory, which involves, “the
interaction of cognitive schemas and organizational context” (Elsbach, Barr, & Hargadon, 2005,
p. 422). In this regard, Labianca, Gray, and Brass (2000) define cognitive schemas as an
individual’s mental representations of knowledge that allow them to make sense of the world in
conditions of incomplete information. Organizational contexts, on the other hand, refer to
external structures such as physical work environments (Elsbach & Pratt, 2007).
Our empirical data comprised a comparative case analysis of seven separate open-plan
offices in the Collaborative Science Building. We drew upon interview and observation data
collected over six weeks to examine the reasons why individuals in different open-plan offices
had different experiences of collaboration. Our data show the impact of the open-plan offices on
collaboration, and the interactions between schemas (identity, norms, and person) and contexts
(physical, social, and embodied). In particular, we explored the context under which open-plan
offices can promote collaboration via the lens of situated cognition theory (Elsbach et al., 2005).
Based on the results of our interviews and in situ observation, we concluded that physical
arrangement of the open-plan office facilitates collaboration under three circumstances: (1) when
employees self-identify as collaborative and view their roles as involving collaboration with
people in their immediate environment, (2) when employees develop a shared group identity and
view themselves as working together, and (3) when employees develop shared norms about how
to work together.
Consistent with situated cognition theory, we found that the open-office employees in our
study had primarily functional relationships with space (Roth & Jornet, 2013). If employees selfidentified as collaborative people, they would take up opportunities to collaborate that were
provided by the open-plan office. Paradoxically, but consistent with situated cognition theory,
Open-plan offices and collaboration
Page 3
we found that exactly the same features of the open-plan office that afford collaboration can
hinder collaboration: in an physical work arrangement with few physical barriers, employees
used body language to indicate their willingness to interact and collaborate with others, but they
could also keep their heads down and avoid eye contact to minimize interactions.
Also consistent with situated cognition theory, we found that employees only
collaborated with others who they perceived as part of their own group. When employees from
different workgroups shared an open-plan office they often avoided interacting with people
outside of their own group. Open-plan offices helped employees develop person-schemas about
the knowledge, beliefs and sensitivities of people in their own group, but not those who they
viewed as belonging to other groups. It seems that simply co-locating people in a shared openplan office is not enough to facilitate collaboration; managers must also make efforts to develop
a shared social identity (Ashforth & Mael, 1989) so that people who share an office feel they
have a reason to work together.
Finally, we found that employees collaborated when they developed norms about how to
behave in the open-plan office. Employees who discussed their expectations with each other
were able to anticipate other people’s responses and modify their own behavior. For example, the
human relations officers in one of the offices we studied preferred a noisy office, but were
careful to minimize noise so the scientists in the rest of their office had a quiet environment to
work in. In this respect, our findings align with the construct of group norms (Feldman, 1984).
We suggest that people who work in an open-plan office need to develop shared understandings
about managing distractions, privacy and interactions. This allows them to establish a common
identity and to collaborate.
Open-plan offices and collaboration
Page 4
References
Ashforth, B. E., & Mael, F. 1989. Social identity theory and the organization. Academy of
Management Review, 14, 20-39
Bodin-Danielsson, C., & Bodin, L. 2008. Office type in relation to health, well-being and job
satisfaction among employees. Environment and Behavior, 40, 636-668.
Boutellier, R., Ullman, F., Schreiber, J., & Naef, R. 2008. Impact of office layout on
communication in a science-driven business. R&D Management, 38, 372-391.
De Croon, E. M., Sluiter, J. K., Kuijer, P., & Frings-Dresen, M. 2005. The effect of office
concepts on worker health and performance: A systematic review of the literature.
Ergonomics, 48, 119–34.
Elsbach, K. D., Barr, P. S., & Hargadon, A. B. 2005. Identifying situated cognition in
organizations. Organization Science, 16, 422-433.
Elsbach, K. D., & Pratt, M. G. 2007. The physical environment in organizations. The Academy of
Management Annals, 1, 181-224.
Feldman, D. C. 1984. The enforcement and development of group norms. Academy of
Management Review, 9, 47-53.
Labianca, G., Gray, B., & Brass, D. J. 2000. A grounded model of organizational schema change
during empowerment. Organization Science, 11, 235–257.
Roper, K. O., & Juneja, P. 2008. Distractions in the workplace revisited. Journal of Facilities
Management, 6, 91-109.
Roth, W. M., & Jornet, A. 2013. Situated cognition. Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Cognitive
Science, 4, 463-478.
Rousseau, V., Aube, C., & Savoie, A. 2006. Teamwork behaviors: A review and an integration
of frameworks. Small Group Research, 37, 540–570.
Zahn, G. L. 1991. Face-to-Face communication in an office setting: The effects of position,
proximity, and exposure. Communication Research, 18, 737-754.