Apple Park opened in April of this year. John Gruber, the owner of Daring Fireball , an Apple-oriented website reported on his podcast that Vice President Johny Srouji refused to move in. When he first saw the floorplans of the circular building, John reported that “when he was shown the floor plans, he was more or less just ‘f*ck that, f*ck you, f*ck this, this is bullsh*t.’ They built his team their own building, off to the side on the campus… My understanding is that that building was built because Srouji was like, ‘f*ck this, my team isn’t working like this.'”
How do you spend $5 billion dollars on a new building that people refuse to occupy? It’s simple. You don’t bring them along the process.
‘f*ck this, my team isn’t working like this.’
The designers at Foster + Partners did not re-invent the modern office- the open concept, collaborative and flexible offices in Apple’s new building are the same best practice principles you see in pretty much all new office design. Granted, it’s over the top in exactly the way you would expect a design-obsessed company’s headquarters to be—recessed handrails, power and data lines hidden in mullions—full-on loveliness.
And so, when you hear (third hand, so excuse the language!) that Apple vice president Johny Srouji refused to move into the building after the floor plan’s unveiling and that a separate building was built for his team, you know something went awry. You don’t get to the point of having senior staff dropping the f-bomb and refusing to move into space by being good communicators. You do it by planning and designing in a vacuum.
So- how do you, as owners of spaces and managers of people, figure this out?
- This is not a product launch!
Apple pretty much wrote the book on product launches. My husband (a life-long mac fan boy) plans his life around Apple keynotes. What Steve Jobs wore, his trademark turtlenecks and jeans, how he strode around the bare stage, how Jonny Ive spoke so passionately about design, how tight lipped they were about a new product until the keynote; these elements are embedded in Apple culture. They wrote the book on unveiling new product.
New space is not the same as new products, though. People get very attached to where they work and how they work. Their spaces may not suit them well, but it is what they are used to. So, using the “keep it secret until the great reveal” strategy that raises expectations and fosters excitement for the latest phone will probably fall flat.
New space (especially new space that implies a new way of working) makes people anxious. The earlier that people understand what is going on and why changes are needed, the easier the transition will be. If PowerPoint presentations with pretty renderings revealed at town halls were enough to calm people’s nerves, I would be out of a job.
- Communication is not just talking
If listening isn’t part of your plan to communicate new information, you are missing the boat. This doesn’t mean that every suggestion is acted upon. But having time for engagement where people genuinely have an opportunity for input—and that it will be considered as a potential change—is a key strategy to get buy-in. A great resource is the IAP2 spectrum of engagement. Being upfront about what kind of feedback will be received and how it may or may not be incorporated into the plans is critical in getting people on board, and keeping them there.
- Engagement isn’t a one-time deal
People want to be communicated to. On a recent new building project, we took the stance that we would keep communicating until people told us to stop. We had a website, a live FAQ, user groups for each team moving, three advisory groups, a newsletter with project updates, a staff liaison, a dedicated change management leader from HR… the list goes on. This level of change management is not necessary for all projects. But for this project, where large segments of the institution were being impacted and major pushback happened it was announced, it was essential. And resulted in a hugely successful transition.
- Get your leaders on board!
This one is simple. If your leaders don’t agree with a new plan, their people won’t either. Spending extra time with your leaders to make sure they understand the plan and the reasoning behind it will save you time trying to herd all your people. No amount of communication and engagement will work if staff see that their leader is not on board. Johny Srouji got an entire building built because he didn’t get the concept. I’ve seen entire departments pack, move, look around, and refuse to unpack. The next day, their leader moved them right back home. Leaders may not personally agree with where you are going, but they should be able to see the benefit for their people. If not, you have more communicating to do.
Is anyone doing this right?
Apple isn’t the only tech company that’s growing. Microsoft also needs to expand their space to meet their space crunch. They are taking a very different approach to communicating with their people though. A year ahead of a new refresh project, they posted a blog that they will be starting a massive renovation and construction project. It isn’t a massive single new building, but that’s not the differentiator. The differentiator is that they are communicating now, well in advance of changes. And they promise to keep communicating.