More than just rearranging furniture, design develops the workplace dynamic. Visuals can facilitate workflow, engage your audience and create an environment where your employees and your clients can thrive.
Brand and design are inexplicably tied to each other – one influences the other. Visual communication is an effective yet creative way of blending these two elements together. Neutral7, a Florida-based design group, offers ways to incorporate a company’s brand into a workspace, because where you work affects how you work.
1: Cultivate company morale
Successful companies fuse strategy with creativity. Ensuring mission-statement visibility acts as a daily reminder of what the company is, what it does and why it matters. Displaying a company’s mission statement, using a visually engaging wall graphic creates company-wide cohesion to achieve both reach and impact.
2: Distinguish your brand from competitors
First impressions are everything. According to branding-expert, Marty Neumeier, a brand is a person’s gut feeling, because brands are determined by individuals, not companies, markets or the public (The Brand Gap). A visible, engaging logo provides an opportunity to create the “gut feeling” your company intends to evoke.
3: Build relationships with storytelling
The human brain is more accustomed to processing visuals than words – 90 percent more. Thus, highly visual storytelling is scientifically proven to engage publics more effectively than non-visual communication. Presenting your company’s history in the form of a professional display timeline communicates information that words will not.
4: Direct with wayfinding
Wayfinding, the signage that guides people from point A to point B successfully, without anxiety, frustration or confusion, is imperative to any successful infrastructure. Highlighting the significance of highly visual communication, wayfinding makes use of symbols to guide people to where they need to be, with minimalistic clarity.
5: Inspire with art
Adding artwork to your workspace shows that you take pride in your working environment. Also, employees who control the design and layout of their workspaces are happier, healthier, and up to 32 percent more productive than those who don’t (Exeter University, School of Psychology). Adding a canvas print to an office wall benefits both employee and customer experience.
6: Craft an alternative experience
Workspaces that lack windows, visual art and natural lighting can feel uninspiring and decrease employee productivity. Craft your ideal workspace wherever you go with a wall mural that evokes the gut feeling your brand evokes. After all, non-traditional work environments inspire non-traditional ideas and can elevate your brand to the next level.
7: Illuminate productivity
Intangible design elements, like lighting are crucial elements that affect your bottom line. Great lighting doesn’t have to cost a fortune. Drop ceiling lights can be transformed with custom color gels. In addition to improving aesthetics in your office, great lighting improves the overall quality of life of employees and the work they produce thereafter.
Photography by Neutral7
ALBEY CORONEL is the owner and creative director of neutral7 design group. He has over 20 years of experience in the development and production of graphic products for businesses.