How to Make a Recharge Room in Your Office
- Written by Diana Smith
Having a regular break every now and then is something essential when it comes to keeping your productivity at its peak. First of all, a break is important for one to remain alert and keep their focus at the desired level. Second, a break can prevent decision fatigue, which is a scenario where making consistent decisions may wear down your willpower.
Another advantage of having regular breaks is the fact that they restore your motivation for work, especially in the long run. Lastly, resting can help you consolidate all that you’ve learned prior to it (new facts and information) thus making your decisions much more effective. You can make all of this happen by creating a great recharge room and here are several tips on how to do this.
Reconnection with nature
The first thing you need to do is understand that connection with nature has a therapeutic effect on your mind and body and there are several ways in which you can make this room the embodiment of it. First of all, you can decorate the break room with some indoor plant or even use floral and natural motifs when accessorizing. Ideally, the break room would have a balcony. Even though this is something that you can’t make, it’s something to look for when choosing an office space to lease out. Lastly, some even prefer to make a deck on the building’s roof in order to create this kind of environment. When you consider the boost in productivity that would come from it, this project would definitely have a positive ROI.
Cafeteria with a healthy menu
Another thing you need to understand is the fact that the food that we eat and the beverages that we drink definitely affect our alertness and mental capabilities. For instance, healthy fats are crucial for the development of one’s mental capacities, whereas it’s refined grain and sugars that slow one down both physically and mentally. The problem with this lies in the fact that the majority of your employees don’t exactly have healthy eating habits, yet, with a cafeteria with a healthy menu, this can be changed to your favor. A reliable coffee machine is also a must, seeing as how coffee affects both one’s focus and motivation.
A brief workout session
The next concept that you should consider investing in is a workout area. Other than keeping one healthy, thus making them take fewer sick days, a brief workout can keep one awake for a prolonged period of time and give them a chance to outperform your expectations. Still, keep in mind that you don’t really need to invest in weightlifting gear. Some soft padding on the floor and workout equipment like assault air bikes for some light cardio is virtually all that you’ll need here. Hiring a fitness instructor to run these half-hour workout sessions is A) not expensive and B) quite effective.
Nap area
Recent studies have shown that even a 20-minute nap (a power nap) session may be enough for one’s brain to partially recover. This is why more and more employers are considering the idea of nap areas in their offices. In order to get started, you need to pick a room that’s in a remote, insulated part of the office and provide it with some beds or mattresses and dimmable lights. This way, you’ll avoid scenarios where your employees have to take improvised naps in their car or at the conference room, which is something that more and more people are doing every day.
A place to have some fun
The last thing you can do to help your employees recharge their batteries is creating a games room where they can have some fun. All you need to do in order to achieve this is to install a pinball machine in your break area. This can further gamify the break experience by introducing the spirit of competitiveness to it (high score table). On the other hand, a pool table, an arcade machine or a ping-pong table might be a better idea, due to the fact that they provide group fun instead.
Finally, the reason why you need a recharge room and can’t just introduce some of these elements to your regular work area is that you need to keep these two things apart. People who are resting shouldn’t distract those who are still working. Second, you need to ensure that everyone goes on a break, even those who claim that they don’t need them. It’s quite obvious why this would be difficult if you had a single area for these two functions. In other words, a recharge room needs to be a standalone entity without your work premises and with the above-listed five tips, you can easily make this happen.
Daily Bulletin
