EXPERIENCING GREAT GROWTH
With 14 years of facility and management experience and through three acquisitions most recently with Carbonite my role has been to manage the Indianapolis office as the Manager of Workplace Strategies and Solutions for Carbonite. Within this role, I was lucky enough to be entrusted with managing the exciting remodel of our office.
In recent years, Carbonite, has experienced great growth and has expanded its real estate footprint through acquisitions such as Double-Take Software here in Indy. Our lease term was quickly approaching, and we wanted our new space in Indianapolis as well as our other site locations to reflect our Carbonite culture by creating commonality in design, branding and improvements to our workplace environments. We took a holistic approach to designing our space utilizing an employee survey, home location heat map, site leadership interviews and lessons learned from other site projects.
CHOOSING PARALLEL DESIGN GROUP
Before we hired Parallel Design Group to help us with the interior design work, we had dated brown and cream tones throughout with tall high cubicle stations and offices surrounding the perimeter – an uninspiring, inclusive space for our employees. Now, our progressive and trendy space has a monochromatic color scheme with pops of color aligned with our marketing color palette that really freshen up the space. We also have cool Star Wars graphics, art work and a huge graffiti mural that brings that “WOW” factor adding to our overall positive employee experience.
One great aspect that we loved about Parallel Design was the exercise that they led us through with their PDG Workplace Study. Parallel guided us to hear from our employees conducting an employee survey and site leadership interviews as well as lessons learned from previous site projects to focus on the areas for workspace improvements. Before we conducted the Workplace Study internally, Briana and I took a trip to Boston and learned what was working and what wasn’t working in their office. The study of the Boston Carbonite Office was a good starting point and we walked away with a lot of learnings. The biggest takeaways: our organization needed to have consistent standardizations in our workstations with features such as programable standing desks, personal storage tower and partition wall height at a level to allow for privacy while also allowing for visibility across an open workspace floor plan. Another take away was creating flexible work spaces such as huddle areas and phone rooms in an open workplace environment. These learnings were helpful and we worked hard to make them a priority in the Indianapolis office.
DIGGING IN - IDENTIFYING KEY CHALLENGES AND CREATING SOLUTIONS
We approached this big project in two phases. The first phase was completed in 2017, which was finishing off our server room. The second phase (and most notable) was when we finished the whole space of Suite 300 (finished in Nov. 2018). Both projects were a labor of love, but were certainly worth it, as it improved our employee morale and functional space within our office significantly.
We quickly learned that the biggest challenge of the office remodel was going to be educating our employees about the decision to go from closed spaces to open spaces. This decision was made based on the Workplace Study we conducted. Initially some were concerned with privacy and noise. However – our end result? Much more collaboration.
Also – walking away from the Boston office visit gave us ideas of how to continue the internal Star Wars theme and looked for ways that were economically and visually affective. PDG provided guidance referring us to Eye4 Group to collaborate on creating the Storm Troopers front reception area, Death Star Conf. Room and the main lobby Carbonite Marketing graphic wall. I also researched and collaborate with FAB Crew graffiti artist in creating the stunning wall mural based off the Star Wars planets and our Carbonite name. Guest and visitors can easily spot throughout the space all the little details from the conference room window film to the Star Wars name plates that continue the theme.
In addition to an open concept, with Parallel’s guidance, we were able to implement the following changes – which made a world of a difference!
· First off – Lots of light. The Sr. Director of Engineering for Carbonite Bryan Owens recently shared with me, “I never thought that the amount of natural light would make such a difference.”
· Mural + the art work – What a WOW factor for our space! Local Indianapolis muralists, FAB Crew, Dan Thompson and Ben Long were the muralists who created a one of a kind work that employees get to enjoy during the work day.
· Conference rooms – these are uniquely named after Star Wars planets selected by the employees.
· The little details highlighting the Star Wars theme- Jedi Font name plates – always playing into the theme.
· Multi-purpose room (The Force, Light Side and Dark Side) – divisible large conf. room, training, and designated game area (ping pong table) makes it feel a little more casual and fun.
· Technology – dashboards in the open areas used for R&D, Customer Care and Success call center, touchscreen TVs in Conference rooms and huddle spaces.
· Huddle Area – cozy little areas for alternative workspace or for taking breaks in between work = increased productivity!
THE RESULT? AN INCREASED COMMUNAL VIBE
Although our employees have the option to work from home once a week, we have seen a common theme of more and more employees choosing to come into the office. We see that this is no coincidence, but rather that they are really enjoying the new space and thriving at work. Now more than ever – we are seeing collaboration amongst employees, which we welcome and appreciate.
As our culture has grown to be stronger because of the well-designed and multi-functional space, we see a more communal vibe within our organization. As a company, we host Beer Cart Fridays, Monday Lunches, which are catered in to build camaraderie and community within our four walls. In addition, we enjoy hosting monthly and quarterly events – we always find reasons to celebrate!
It’s been really cool to see our employees flourish in their new workspace. They truly seem happy. Truly. Everyone likes the space and trust me when I say, that’s a WIN! Most recently the Senior VP of Products and Engineering, Rob Beeler, came into the office with his son who is getting ready to graduate from college. His son stated, “Wow! …This makes me want to get a job!”
As Carbonite continues to grow, we have accounted for continual growth within the next 3-5 years. We currently have 60 employees onsite. We believe the new digs, in collaboration with Parallel Design Group are a great kick start to get good talent into the door.
PARTNERS
· Commercial Real Estate: JLL (Matt Waggoner)
· Commercial Real Estate: JLL (Mike Gresham)
· Construction: Capitol Construction (Jeremy Coy)
· Flooring: Milliken & Company (McKenzie Swihart)
· Ceilings: Armstrong Ceilings (Phil Caito)
· Office Furniture: WB Mason (James Peters)
· AV Integration: Phoenix Systems (Andy Vaccaro)
· Wall Graphics: Eye4Group (J.R. Knight and James Hoffman)
· Graffiti Artist: FAB Crew (Ben Long & Dan Thompson)
· Lighting: Specified Lighting (Melinda Dykstra)
· Photography: (Russ Richey)