Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to research the impact of sustainable office buildings on occupant's comfort and self‐assessed performance and work engagement.Design/methodology/approach: The research consists in an empirical study of 18 office buildings and is based on survey data from almost 1,500 employees.Findings: The study shows that the building itself has a clear impact on the comfort level of the building user. Also, the positive impact of certain features, such as operable windows and the absence of air conditioning, can be clearly identified. While productivity is not directly correlated to comfort levels, work engagement is. Generally, the analysis shows that specific building aspects seem to have an influence on user comfort and with that, also an impact on productivity; however, this impact appears to be limited.Originality/value: This is a very important insight since this shows the connection between employee and company and thus demonstrates that a high user comfort can reduce the turnover rate of employees. Therefore, additional planning towards user comfort and social sustainability can be shown to yield real returns.

Student social connectedness is indicated to be changing with the increasing digitalisation of universities. This narrative literature review aims to bring new meanings to the hybrid university learning environment (HULE), and to develop a framework for the benefit of student social connectedness by using placemaking theories. It searches through the academic literature for evidence of experience with three attributes of social connectedness: socialising, social support, and sense of belonging, in relation to individuals’ sense of place, bringing a range of outcomes, such as identity development, which might contribute to improved social connectedness. This is then expanded in the HULE by looking at the physical and online spaces, with a focus on liminal space and co-design. The findings show that an overly rigid structure of the HULE can cause negative student social connectedness, with co-design being proposed as a way of creating a tailored and connected learning experience. However, this is underdeveloped for learning environment needs and could be enhanced by applying placemaking theories to map levels of student social connectedness in the physical location and in the more-than-real ‘non-places’. This provides an innovative perspective of the HULE based on student social connectedness, impacting the existing pedagogical approach for university courses.

Purpose: Building on fundamental work on usability of workplaces, this paper aims to extend the perspective of usability as an approach in delivering workplace solutions. To explore the content and implications of usability, the concept is differentiated into two sub-concepts: usefulness and user-friendliness.Design/methodology/approach: The theoretical rationale for the proposed conceptual specification is presented and explored using data from two independent research projects: a qualitative interview study in an office relocation project in Finland and a quantitative survey study of 1,420 office users of 43 buildings in Switzerland. The goal of the empirical research is to capture the elements of user experience connected to usability using the distinction between usefulness and user-friendliness.Findings: The results from both studies show that perceived support of work activities by workspaces in relation to work tasks is the main element of usefulness. User-friendliness incorporates comfort and control as the two most important aspects. Correlations between usefulness and user-friendliness and outcomes of usable workspace design are low for self-assessed performance, moderate for job satisfaction and high for work area satisfaction.Practical implications: Providing useful workplaces supports users’ job performance while designing for user-friendliness is correlated with user satisfaction.Originality/value: The differentiation of usefulness and user-friendliness of office environments provides a new way to describe user experience. The integration of qualitative and quantitative research strategies strengthens the research evidence.

<!----> <!----> An extensive literature consistently identifies a lack of privacy as the key source of dissatisfaction among workers, particularly for those occupying open office structures. However, theoretical perspectives on work privacy vary greatly, and there is little agreement on what work privacy constitutes. As a result, the available evidence lacks comparability and undermines the ability to draw conclusions that could serve as a guide to workplace design and management. This chapter gives an overview on different conceptualisations of work privacy, highlighting inconsistencies, and introduces a new multidimensional conceptualisation and corresponding measure of work privacy fit. To highlight the relevance of the work privacy theory and its applicability to workplace research, the chapter discusses environmental and social predictors of privacy fit and privacy desires as well as health- and work-related consequences of poor privacy fit. Further, the chapter gives an overview on quantitative and qualitative methods to study work privacy, such as the new measure of privacy fit (PAW). Theoretical and methodological limitations are pointed out, and avenues of future research are suggested. The relevance of work privacy theory to practice is discussed. <!----> <!---->

Usability theory has its roots in ICT. It has been adapted and applied in the workplace. Usability marks a shift from a functional-technical perspective on workplaces to a focus on user experience and the interaction between users and their work environments. Usability of workplace theory describes these interactions in terms of culture, context, and situation and relates them to core components of usability: effectiveness, efficiency, and satisfaction. The usability perspective can be applied in strategic, developmental, operational, and evaluative phases of workplace projects as well as in workplace-related processes and continuous improvement. Usability of workplaces is discussed as a theoretical approach and regarding the application in usability briefing, usability evaluations, and usability management.

<!----> <!----> Action regulation theory addresses the cognitive regulation of actions. Action regulation takes place on three levels: automated regulation, flexible action patterns, and intellectual regulation. These regulation levels are activated on an as-needed basis to sequentially perform actions contributing to achievement of goals and sub-goals. Action regulation is described in terms of regulation requirements (complexity) and regulation possibilities (control). Applied to the work environment it provides a psychological account of regulation problems or environmental stressors in three broad categories. Regulation obstacles refer to regulation difficulties caused by unfavourable environmental conditions and interruptions by people. Overtaxing regulations refers to overload caused by overstimulation by task inherent factors, physical environment, or social environment. Regulation uncertainty refers to qualitative overload. Action regulation theory generally contributes to the understanding of job demands, resources, and stressors at work and its application in workplace research allows identifying and understanding environmental influences, as part of work conditions, on employees. <!----> <!---->