WIU heads to the Capital of Style and Design

In December the WIU held its first forum in Italy, hosted at Herman Miller’s showroom in the heart of Milan’s fashionable design district. The WIU presented its Creativity at Work research (see link on homepage) which explored different creative employee types and how workplace design can support their needs. The audience included representatives from major international business (such as Mattel and Royal Sun Alliance) as well as journalists from leading Italian publications. The presentation will be repeated at the Italian Chamber of Commerce in April 2008 (contact WIU for further information).

Q1 2008 will see the release of the WIU’s innovative research on Social Capital in the workplace. We are applying a concept most regularly used in the realm of residential property development to the sphere of commercial organisations, to understand how workplace design can build community within companies. High levels of social capital (or, put simply, a strong sense of community) delivers business benefits such as higher employee job satisfaction, motivation, retention rates and stronger collective vision. There is undoubtedly scope to leverage workplace design more effectively to maximize this opportunity. The research will be available in Q2 2008, accompanied by a series of forums. If your organisation would like to participate in the research, or attend the related forums, please contact us at info@workplaceintellignce.co.uk.

Finally, following the success of the recent WIU Magazine (see homepage link) the new edition is due for publication in Q2 2008. Hard copies of past or future editions can be obtained by registering on our homepage.