Recent trends in the workplace environment to be focussed on workplace as an area of innovation:

§  Make way for the incredible shrinking workstation
Individual workstation square footage is being slashed dramatically—in some cases, to less than half the traditional size—in part to allow organizations to devote more space for meetings and informal interaction

§  Say goodbye to high partitions, hello to open office
Workstations are not only shrinking, they are becoming more open. Partitions are either being junked completely, or their height is being lowered to foster greater employee interaction. Some organizations are even getting rid of private offices, or at least reducing their number significantly

§  Manage noise and privacy
An open office environment has one major drawback: lack of acoustical privacy. With office workers sitting together more snugly, and smaller partitions (or none at all) separating them, noise levels can raise, sometimes making it harder to concentrate. Therefore employees should keep in mind that being loud is not a good idea in an Open Office lay out

§  Program in more team rooms, not necessarily more conference rooms.
Conference rooms appear oversized especially when you have three or four people meeting in 10- or 12-seat rooms. That wasted space is money not spent well. Better to offer team rooms of varying capacity for groups of different size.

§  Allow for an appropriate amount of flexible space.
Many traditional procedures and tasks are becoming obsolete; new high-tech operations have to be generated from scratch. As work groups grow and shrink in response, the workspace may need to be adjusted accordingly