You can’t get away from Artificial Intelligence (or AI is we’ll be referring to it from now on). If it’s not a news story about how someone has invested umpteen billion dollars into a new AI startup it’s a blog post telling you just exactly how likely it is that AI is going to take your job in the next five years.
And you’ve probably had a play with it yourself, too. Perhaps you’ve asked an AI chatbot to summarise an article for you, or generated an image of a monkey riding a bicycle.
But how can AI be used in the office design industry? Is it going to take over all the designers’ jobs or is it a complete waste of time?
Well, we think it’s somewhere between the two. Before we get into how AI can be used for office interior design, let’s just have a quick recap of exactly what AI is – and also, what limitations it has.
So what is AI?
AI is not – despite what the name might suggest – intelligent. At least, not in the same way that us humans are intelligent. It’s extremely good at analysing data, and making predictions. It’s rubbish at actual creativity (though it can fake it quite well with sheer brute force, which we’ll talk about later).
So it’s unlikely that AI tools are going to take over from creative office designers. But there are plenty of applications where they can be really useful – including for design.
Let’s have a look at the office design process, and how AI tools can support it.
Data-based design
We know that AI is really good at analysing data. It really excels at the kinds of big data that us humans struggle to get our brains around.
So, it can be used to analyse the way that your office is currently being used. Before you start work on your new office design, take the time to install an AI sensor system in the building and use it to gather data on how your employees use the space.
Which rooms get used most. Which are empty most of the time. What directions people walk in. When the lights get turned on. Precisely what Hans from HR does when he disappears from his desk for half an hour in the afternoon.
Well, maybe not the last one. But AI can use sensors to build an in-depth picture of how your office is used.
But it doesn’t end there. AI is also great at prediction and pattern recognition. So, it can take that data and use it to build suggestions as to how your new office might work best for your staff.
And you can feed your requirements into the AI model to get customised results. Want a space to promote collaboration? No problem. An area for quiet concentration? Sorted.
It can give your designers hard data to work with, and that lets them do their best work.
Space design
AI will never replace a great office designer. But it can help them to work faster and more efficiently. Space usage analysis is a great start, but how else can AI help in the design process?
Well, it may not be the best designer in the world, but it’s certainly the fastest. So, designers can feed in the analysis data – along with things like space constraints and client requirements – and an AI designer can produce hundreds of possible solutions in seconds.
Chances are, none of them will be the perfect solution. But they’ll give your designer a wide range of possible starting points, which can be really helpful to avoid getting stuck on one specific idea.
Then, when you’re a bit further through the design process, AI can quickly produce mock-ups and visualisations to give the client an idea how work is progressing.
Again, they probably won’t be as good as you’d get from a pro visualiser. But for something you can access in a few seconds, AI visualisations can be invaluable.
Enhancing workplace efficiency
AI monitoring doesn’t have to stop with the layout of your workspace. You can build AI monitoring into systems in your new office like lighting, climate control and security.
At a basic level, that can be a great way to reduce your carbon footprint by minimising energy usage. But workspace AI is smarter than that.
Let’s say your smart building system is hooked up to your room booking system. It knows the marketing team has a meeting at 10am in meeting room one, and they like fresh air and natural light. So, it opens the blinds and windows and sets the light temperature to a nice warm orange colour.
But accounting are in at 11am, and they like to project PowerPoint decks onto the big screen. They also always complain about being cold. So, when marketing have finished, it closes the windows and blinds, drops down the projector screen, cranks up the heating and sets the lighting nice and low.
Or, you could use AI to monitor and analyse meeting room usage to help you understand why room 1 is always booked and no one uses room 2. Or how software packages are used so you can alter your subscriptions to get the best value. Or you could use it to predict when resources will be busy so you can allocate them more efficiently.
The possibilities really are almost endless.
The future of AI in the workplace
As AI becomes more common in the workplace, systems will become more closely integrated. That means you can personalise your AI interactions even more.
AI could monitor your employees for telltale indicators of stress or burnout and suggest taking breaks or shifting to other tasks. If the signs are more severe, it could flag the issue to managers to take appropriate action.
Your security system could register that Linda from recruitment has booked hot desk 72-a, and has just clocked into the building. It knows she likes the lights on her desk low, her screen brightness right down and she’ll definitely want a coffee in the next ten minutes. So, it sets the lights just right, cranks down the brightness and pre-heats the coffee machine.
Some of these examples might seem a bit like science fiction but the technology is there if you want to use it. And while it might not save heaps of time or have massive productivity boosts, making your employees feel welcome and appreciated has significant value to your business.
Ethical considerations and challenges
There are a lot of benefits to increased use of AI in your workplace. But there are some pretty major ethical considerations too.
What if Sandra from IT doesn’t want you monitoring her stress levels and claims that it actually makes her more stressed?
What if Giles from Finance doesn’t want his face on the AI biometrics system?
Unfortunately, there’s no simple answer. You’ll need to consult with employees and unions and make sure that the rollout of any AI based services is both transparent and inclusive.
You’ll also want to make sure that you closely monitor any inherent biases in the data that the AI is monitoring.
What do we mean by that? Well, imagine that Alice from Business Admin manages Bernard and she really doesn’t like him. So Bernard’s always in trouble and passed over for promotion.
If you feed that data into an AI, it won’t like Bernard either. And it might extrapolate that data further, and decide it doesn’t like anyone with glasses. Or who drinks decaf coffee in the afternoon.
It’s possible to avoid these biases when you’re training an AI, but you’ll need to be aware they’re there in the first place to do so.
Conclusion
AI is going to revolutionise the way we create and interact with our workspaces. The potential for change is incredible. But it’s important to understand the drawbacks of the technology, and build in safeguards against these from the very start.
If your office needs a refresh – with or without AI – get in touch.