Office Shock: Creating Better Futures for Working and Living

by Bob Johansen, Joseph Press, Christine Bullen

Overview

“A thoughtful, practical read about the future of the flexible office.”—Adam Grant

“Office shock” is an abrupt, unsettling change in where, when, how, and even why we work. In this visionary book, three prominent futurists argue that the office is both a place and a process—offices and officing—with a new range of choices, including what they call the emerging officeverse.

To see the possibilities with fresh eyes, we must use future-back thinking to ask, What is the purpose of your officing? What are the outcomes—especially regarding climate—you want to achieve? With whom do you want to office? How will you augment your intelligence? Where and when will you office? How will you create an agile office?

Traditional offices were often unfair, uncomfortable, uncreative, and unproductive. This book explores how to seize this great opportunity to transform office work.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781523003679
Publisher:	Berrett-Koehler Publishers
Publication date:	01/17/2023
Pages:	296
Sales rank:	431,998
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.66(d)

About the Author

Bob Johansen is a distinguished fellow at the Institute for the Future in Silicon Valley. He is the author or coauthor of twelve books, including Full-Spectrum Thinking.

Joseph Press is a former workplace designer, transformation expert, and futures architect. He is the coauthor of IDeaLs (Innovation and Design as Leadership) and cofounder of the consulting cooperative MakeOurFuture.

Christine Bullen is an information systems professor who codeveloped the critical success factors methodology when she was at MIT.

Table of Contents

Preface ix

Introduction: The Great Opportunity 1

Part I What Future? 15

Better Futures for Working and Living

1 Futureback Thinking: About Office Shock 17

2 Looking Back to Look Forward: The Technology Didn't Happen Overnight 30

3 Impossible Futures: imagining Better Offices and Officing 49

Office Shock Quick Start Guide appears after page 60.

Part II What Next? 61

Spectrums of Choice for Better Working and Living

4 In Good Company: The Spectrum of Purpose 65

5 Pursuing Prosperity: The Spectrum of Outcomes 79

6 Beyond Sustainability: The Spectrum of Climate Impacts 93

7 Cultivating Community: The Spectrum of Belonging 107

8 Everyone Amplified: The Spectrum of Augmentation 121

9 Better Than Being There: The Spectrum of Place and Time 135

10 Coordinating with Clarity: The Spectrum of Agility 149

Part III What Now? 161

Making Smart Choices for Individuals, Organizations, and Communities

11 Thinking Futureback about Office Shock: Introducing Our Quick Start Guide 163

12 Personal Choices: How You Can Navigate Office Shock 173

13 Organizational Choices: How Your Organization Can Navigate Office Shock 180

14 Community Choices: How Your Community Can Navigate Office Shock 188

Conclusion: What We Can Do Now to Create Better Futures 197

Navigational Stars 207

Discussion Guide 210

Notes 221

Bibliography 242

Acknowledgments 250

Index 256

About the Research 270

About the Authors 273

About the Artists and Artwork 277

About Institute for the Future 281

Editorial Reviews

A thoughtful, practical read about the future of the flexible office.”
—Adam Grant

“… sweeping treatise on how a contemporary workplace crisis has created new ways to transform office life.”
—Kirkus Reviews

“Office Shock is an unprecedented chance to reimagine human resources, human augmentation, and the future of belonging.”
—Felecia Pryor, Chief People Officer, John Deere
 
“A strikingly clear guide to creating the superminds on which our future depends.”
—Thomas W. Malone, Professor, MIT Sloan School of Management
 
“Office Shock paints a vivid picture of the future of work with sustainable practices.”
—Ani Dasgupta, CEO, World Resources Institute
 
“I am inspired by the deep acknowledgment of multiple futures celebrated through the amazing illustrations created for these future offices.”
—Lonny J Avi Brooks, Afrofuturist and Professor, California State University, East Bay
 
“This book explores the potential for AI to revolutionize offices.”
—Atefeh Riazi, Executive Director, CIOs without Borders

“Finally, a new, thought-provoking book that gives you strategies for designing your own work future.”
—Jack Nilles, the Father of Telework

“With Office Shock, Johansen, Press, and Bullen provide us with the critical tools to evaluate our working conditions, opening up how we can imagine something radically different.”
—Esteban Kelly, Executive Director, US Federation of Worker Cooperatives

“Getting past all the hyperbole, finally, a book that gives an inspiring but practical vision for the future of work!”
—Mark Johnson, cofounder of Innosight

“Even though external uncertainties will continue to shock how we work, where we work, and when we work, Office Shock reminds us that we can still shape a more humane, environmentally robust, and economically just tomorrow.”
—Lisa Kay Solomon, coauthor of Moments of Impact and Design a Better Business and Futurist in Residence, Stanford d.school

“Office Shock is an urgent opportunity to create new ways for computers and people to work together.”
—Larry Quinlan, former Global CIO, Deloitte

“Office Shock provides invaluable insight to help everyone navigate a world of work that is changing at warp speed.”
—Aron Cramer, President, Business for Social Responsibility

“Where purpose-driven people work for purpose-driven organizations. Not many books describe with impeccable clarity the future of work (and life) to their readers as Office Shock does. A must-have to train yourself to be a forward thinker.”
—Stephan Mardyks, CEO, House of Leading Brands

From the Publisher

2023-01-19
Johansen, Press, and Bullen’s sweeping treatise on how a contemporary workplace crisis has created new ways to transform office life.

According to Johansen, Press, and Bullen, a “time of global turmoil” culminating in the Covid-19 pandemic has resulted in “office shock,” a crescendo of employee discontent. The sting of obvious inequity, lack of diversity, absence of a positive office culture, and low job satisfaction has brought about a crisis in work culture. However, the co-authors claim that this crisis has also paved the way for the “Great Opportunity,” which is a chance to formulate a brighter vision of office life. The co-authors envision this future broadly—they are interested in the entire sphere of work-life that goes beyond the traditional office to the “officeverse” and the “archipelago of anytime/anyplace mixes of media—including office buildings—that you will be able to choose among to determine where, when, and how you work.” To assist with the decision-making process that determines what the offices of the future will look like—they will be “tailor-made, and personalized” to maximize the happiness of their employees—the authors provide an “office shock mixing board,” a practical tool indicative of the book’s pragmatic orientation. For example, a “spectrum of purpose” swings from individual to collective goods, while a “spectrum of belonging” covers the space between the value of difference in the workspace and the comforts of familiar ways of doing business. Also, the authors sketch a concise and edifying history of office life, from the traditional “hierarchical” kind to its modern “networked” improvement. Yet despite the book’s celebrations of visionary thinking, most of what’s offered here consists of familiar formulas with the now commonplace peppering of the “latest neuroscience findings,” which are too general to count as substantive evidence. Characteristic of the book’s genre, the co-authors spout plenty of neologisms and corporate jargon: “Full-spectrum thinking is about recognizing patterns across gradients of possibility.” But if one can push past the deluge of corporate-speak, this guide to workplace contentment may offer a practical way to transcend traditional creativity-stifling office work.

A potentially useful collection of solid, common-sense advice but not the prophetic vision it claims to be.

Kirkus Reviews