Your Office Is Green, but Does It Make You Productive?

CHICAGO, IL--(Marketwired - Jul 30, 2014) - Does a green workplace make employees more productive, as environmental sustainability experts have long argued? Commercial real estate services firm JLL (NYSE: JLL) created a program and online tool called Green + Productive™ Workplace to find out, which ties green office space investments to employee productivity gains. The results show that some green practices improve productivity more than others. 

"Contrary to popular perception, not all green offices increase productivity," explains Simone Skopek, Operations Manager, Energy and Sustainability Services, JLL. "Shrinking your office space can reduce heating and cooling costs -- but lead to over-crowding or excessive noise. As beneficial as energy savings can be, green investments create exponentially greater value when they also improve employee wellness and productivity. What works is a holistic approach that tracks metrics for both sustainability and productivity."

Challenging the notion that green offices automatically lead to greater productivity, the Green + Productive Workplace tool compiles scores for both sustainability and productivity measures. These scores are benchmarked against other corporate scores, and also against the Dow Jones Sustainability Index criteria for an organization's corporate real estate. Using the scores, the tool can pinpoint offices and specific activities in need of improvement, and establish a baseline to re-assess the offices every year to maximize their use of space, reduce natural-resource consumption, provide an efficient workplace and demonstrate proof of corporate social responsibility -- meanwhile improving employee engagement, wellness and productivity.

"Green" scores rate the use of energy, water, waste and other resources. "Productive" scores assess factors known to influence employee productivity and engagement, including:

• thermal comfort
• indoor air quality
• access to natural light
• task lighting and computer screen glare reduction
• visual resting spots and references to nature (e.g., plants, artwork, decor, landscape views)
• sound control
• office layouts that correlate to the types of work being performed, including employee interactions, collaboration and "head-down" private space
• proximity to bicycle stands, workout and shower facilities, and health amenities and programs
• location in a "high-walkability" neighborhood with access to transit and amenities
• ergonomic furniture

The Green + Productive™ Workplace assessment flags potential energy savings and productivity gains created by each activity in one or more offices. In one instance, a JLL client found more than $160,000 in productivity gains in a single facility by adopting best practices to improve acoustics, ergonomics, flexible workspaces and hoteling.