An average American spends around 9 hours a day at work, and the environment impacts his productivity, creativity, and cleverness. With that in mind, big dogs such as Google, Facebook, and others give their best shots to design offices in a way to make them a dream of every employee.

The physical environment impacts employees well-being, too.

Lack of privacy, noise, poor air quality and other aspects affect our satisfaction and mental health. Aren't these reasons enough for both employers and employees to pay attention to their offices and think of ideas for creating the environment which will be positive, as well as cozy for people to work?

Inspired by offices of Dropbox, you might want to re-design your working environment to motivate and encourage your employees. These nine ideas will help you succeed.

1. An Apple a Day

A healthy diet is scientifically proven to affect our physical condition, so people should take care of nutrition. Simple as that.

The problem is, most of us are lazy to eat well despite the fact we understand the effect of healthy food. To help your employees diversify a diet, supply them with products that improve brain functions (a cup of green tea, thanks to its L-theanine), let them stay focused (coffee beans), and deliver vitamins (fresh fruits).

An easy solution is to offer corporate wellness programs using products like GOQII. This organization gives employees the opportunity to keep health on their minds even when they aren't in the workplace and giving them full-time access to a coach who can help them with anything from losing weight to stress management.

2. Healthful Workplace

Health depends on far more factors than nutrition only.

To stimulate employees and motivate them to keep a healthy lifestyle, take care of their health by organizing a proper workplace: temperature level, ventilation, light, office furniture - they all influence physical condition, boost spirits, prevent problems with back and neck, and make your employees feel comfortable about the place of work.

3. Workplace Organization

To enhance productivity, pay attention to your workplace: a table, all-in-one PC, comfortable chair, notebooks for drafts, and even a plant - everything should be at hand as it influences your performance at work. In a perfect world, your workplace should inspire you: photos, motivational quotes, funny pictures, or inspiring thoughts from your mentors help a lot.

With workspace organization being time-consuming, you might need actionable tips and advice from experts. Dozens of books and hundreds of articles on the topic are hard to handle, but this infographic combines key points to remember and take into consideration if you decide to re-design working environments for better.

Make your employees motivated, and they will work harder without sacrificing private lives and well-beings.

4. Team Building

"The strength of the team is each member. The strength of each member is the team." ~ Phil Jackson

Team building enhances social relations between staff members, creating the positive working environment between them. Collaboration and task delegation lead to better productivity and more tasks completed daily.

Team spirit encourages goals achievements. But how to maintain it?

Most common team-building techniques include corporate events, office parties, online communication with colleagues, and collaborative tasks. Make sure your employees know each other, have no problems with co-operation, respect other teams' members, and collaborate with everyone efficiently.

5. Career Growth

Self-development is essential for our career growth. To stay competitive, you need to work on improving your skills, as well as provide your employees with opportunities to do the same: seminars, conferences, MOOCs, and courses are the ways to grow professionally.

The digital era makes career development easy of access, as we can master skills or get new knowledge online. All these things not just help you grow but create a positive working environment in your office as well. Confidence in yourself and your knowledge is significant for better motivation, productivity, and attitude toward things you do.

6. Support for Initiative

We all need the motivation to perform better. With that in mind, try to support your employees for initiatives by creating a system of bonuses that would inspire them.

Encourage them to take risks, put the company's needs first, and strive for better results at work. An initiative employee is a real catch for your business, as such people always help it flourish. So, be generous with bonuses: raise, gifts, extra vacation days, and days off are good ideas to motivate your employees to be proactive.

7. Open Communication

People are social beings, and that is why communication plays a significant role for our comfort. Encouraging your employees to socialize, you will enhance their creativity and productivity at work.

Create the environment that would facilitate open collaboration, sharing ideas, complaints, advice, and whatever coworkers want to discuss in a casual atmosphere. Make them feel free to express thoughts and share impressions, which will foster the growth of confidence and unity.

It would be a good thing if you organized a leisure area in the office, a place where people could communicate to each other in spare time.

8. A Day Outside The Office

Changing a working environment for a day or two can boost inspiration and motivation. Why not give your employees a chance to spend a day outside the office and choose an alternative workspace for that time?

It goes to make people happier, build trust, and enhance team building. Working a day from home, cafe, or co-working space (they name it!) can influence efficiency and productivity beyond the call of duty.

9. Brand Union

Psychologists agree on a fundamental human motivation such as the need to belong, which is our emotional need to be accepted by members of a group affecting our behavior.

And, what's more important, the need to belong is a great motivator, too. The hierarchy of needs by Abraham Maslow determines it a part of our social needs, helping people experience companionship and acceptance through relationships. With that in mind, make sure your staff holds themselves out as dear members of your team and enterprise.

They make efforts to achieve goals, so give them an opportunity to savor the moment. Think about some little but cute stuff to remind employees their union with your brand: branded office stuff, gifts, corporate events. etc.

Conclusion

Creating a positive working environment is high on the list of every entrepreneur who wants his employees to work better and with pleasure. Even small details can impact their productivity and performance, so everything, from the temperature in an office to team-building events, is significant for crafting a workplace and keeping your colleagues motivated.