GlobeSt.com: What trends are you noticing in workplace-design elements?

Roman: Overall, we're seeing demand for smaller workstation footprints and more collaborative space. Also, outdoor and amenity space has become very important to the office environment.

People want a more residential feel in their office space, so the lines between home and office design are being blurred. Similarly, natural elements like reclaimed wood and natural daylight have become more popular. Technological advances have minimized or nearly eliminated the need for paper, so many offices need less storage space. Desk space has changed, too, with many employers offering sit-to-stand and other ergonomic tools to promote wellness in the office space.

GlobeSt.com: What do today's office users need from their furniture and facilities that they may not have requested a decade or more ago?

Benge: Choice. There has been a profound shift in the workplace in the last 10 years. Technology lets us chose where we want to work and how we want to work. The talent war lets the worker chose who they want to work for and why they want to work for that cause or company. Today's work environment attracts and inspires, provides a foundation for company culture and seeks to support the knowledge worker. The spaces that we make into a purposeful place for a company includes deliberate thought, design and reflection of the leader's vision. Functional-based design, ergonomics and places for both introverts and extroverts to excel lead the way. On a granular level, we are seeing low cubical wall heights, sit-to-stand options, many types and sizes of quiet spaces, access to daylight and increased mobility.

GlobeSt.com: How do you see workplace design elements changing in the future?

Roman: The future will bring more push toward mobility and the option to leverage technology to work anywhere. I see more shared office and amenity space continuing to grow as the need for square footage continues to shrink.

Wellness will continue to be important and will drive demand for daylight, healthy environments and more.

GlobeSt.com: What else should our readers know about the repositioning and rebranding of your company?

Benge: The repositioning and rebranding of our company came from wanting to represent our mission and what we truly do. When we started to look at what we have done and where we were going, one thing stood out as a unique and dominant attribute of our organization: everyone at Cultura loves what they do, so much so that the people we've recently added to our team, a total of eight over the past year, have all been referred by current employees or are past clients and wanted to join our team.

Most of our team has worked together for 20 or more years in some capacity. We've developed a culture where people love where they work, and when you love where you work, you work harder for your clients, you go above and beyond for your teammates, you look for the best ideas, you seek additional knowledge and education, you contribute to the company and you choose to mix your work and your personal life.

We were very inspired by a book written by Ken Blanchard and Garry Ridge of WD-40, a local San Diego-headquartered company, in which they debunked the idea of a work/life balance, saying that if you love what you do, it all mixes together. What you do in your personal life helps inform your work life and make you a better contributor to the company. When you believe in what you do for work, it allows your personal life to improve as well.

At Cultura, we live this philosophy and want to help other local companies create that within their own organizations through thoughtful conversations around culture and how our furniture and design solutions can help that culture thrive.