Improve Office Dynamics

Your business is your source of income, creativity and job satisfaction. Your goal is to make sure your office looks inviting, has the best equipment and supplies, and your staff is experienced and knowledgeable.
You want to communicate to your clients that your firm provides the best products and services available.
Thus, you’ve attended to your business’s needs with the utmost diligence: spent money in advertising, attended educational lectures and classes, and implemented the latest technology in your profession.
Yet, something is not quite right but you cannot put your finger on it. Your clients are happy – but you’re not attracting “quality” ones.
Maybe you are not attracting the “right ones.” Your staff seems content (for the moment) but internal workings are not flowing easily. You look around and wonder, what’s missing?
What is often missing is an understanding of how the environment – the decor, the architectural elements, the scents, the noise and the particular energy of these elements – affect the day-to-day operations of the office.
You can undertake a renovation, move or add more space. This is a great way to look fresh and updated. Nonetheless, analyzing the inherent energy of the space and its people according to ancient Feng Shui principles may make the difference between an effective office and a pretty space.
The latter temporarily masks the original problems. The design that incorporates Feng Shui principles yields an effective and beautiful space. Additionally, because the space becomes well balanced, it produces an environment that continuously promotes healing and harmony.
Feng Shui is a 6,000-year-old Oriental art and science geared to balancing people and the environment through the use of ancient principles of energy. Particular energies are present in every aspect of the business, including people. Feng Shui recognizes these energies as five elements represented by wood, fire, earth, metal and water that, when manipulated to produce the correct relationships, create harmony.
Thus, a Feng Shui analysis will yield an understanding of how the environment influences work flow and interpersonal relationships within the office, as well as the health and general feeling of the business. It will help uncover “what is missing.”
In reading the energies of the people who work in your office, one may inherently carry wood energy; the other may be an earth kind. These two individuals will have difficulty working together. Adding fire elements (purples, reds or diamonds) will introduce the bridge energy and help both workers coexist in harmony.
Similarly, a staff carrying wood energy will feel overworked, stressed and inefficient in an environment abounding with metal energy – whites, grays and round elements. They will tend to create clutter or feel that the space is crowded, even if it is not. Painting the walls in lavender tones and adding water features or soothing sounds, wavy elements and greenery will provide the nourishment they need to feel supported and productive.
It is well documented that living and working spaces have a profound effect on physical and mental health. An environment created to support the specific energies of its users can make a positive impact in all aspects of your business. Your clients will feel it and want to be a part of it.
The combination of excellent interior design, grounded in Feng Shui principles and the use of non-toxic and sustainable materials, creates a total healing environment.

Lidia Scher is an award-winning interior designer, an accomplished visual artist and Feng Shui master. She has been at the helm of L.A.S. Associates, an interior and architectural design firm based in Arlington, MA for the past 23 years. Her specialty is dental and medical environments where occupants love to be in work in and return to day after day. She is also a partner in Virtual dental Solutions, a web-based consulting company to the dental community.