Open Floor Plans Shouldn’t Open the Door to Pests

Open floor office plans are still trending and in general are great for encouraging workers to collaborate, lowering employer costs and making workplaces flexible for the mobile workforce. With approximately 20 to 25 percent of the workforce telecommuting at some frequency, and studies showing employees away from their desks 50 to percent of the time, according to Global Workplace Analytics, these open floor office plans aren’t going anywhere anytime soon.

However, you want to make sure your open floor plan doesn’t open the door to pests.

One of the effects of open floor plans is densification – more people per square foot. That means more dirty coffee mugs, leftover sandwich wrappers (and the like) PSF. All of those are the sweet office perks that lure Millennials … and bugs. Space planners and designers have added more break rooms and water stations encouraging workers to move around and spur impromptu meetings. However, pests survive on water and thrive on creamers, sugars and crumbs, so make sure you have janitorial staff cleaning and checking around these pest attractions often. And, it may be a good idea to encourage employees to clean up after themselves and report any problems.

You can find more helpful tips to help manage unwanted office guests in an open floor office environment by downloading our “More People. More Pests” Densification resource.