Understanding Innovation in the Workspace: A case study

Opportunities for innovation and creativity are widely known to depend on the flow and exchange of information and ideas. In recent years, the importance of the spatial environment in facilitating such social exchange has been increasingly recognised. In this paper we present research undertaken with a UK based media company investigating the relationship between innovation and the office environment, both in terms of social and physical space. We integrate the analytical approaches of Social Network Analysis, which has emerged from the social sciences as an important means of visualising workplace relations, and Space Syntax Analysis from the disciplines of architecture and the built environment. Dale and Burrell (2008, xii) invite us to consider; "how spatial practices 'produce people' (Alvesson and Willmott 1992, p.5) and how organisational aesthetics is much more than a simple beautifying of the workplace, but is an issue of politics and power." Understanding the everyday means by which work colleagues interact in order to conduct their work is therefore, an increasingly relevant concern for the learning organisation aiming to support the optimum conditions for efficiency, innovation and the management of tacit knowledge. The research presented here has aimed to adopt such a ‘unitary’ approach to organisational space. The case study thus provides a means to think holistically about the socio-spatial nature of organisational creativity in aiming toward a better understanding of the opportunities at Dataco for workplace innovation and how these may be enhanced within their business practice.