Nonergonomic! Feng Shui For Business

Nonergonomic! Feng Shui For Business
[人因工程 ]
(2003/03/18)


Feng Shui For Business

Desk Position

When sitting at your workstation it is strongly recommended that you do not have your back to a door, corridor or passageway, unless absolutely necessary. This is because a significant percentage of your conscious, and particularly your subconscious, awareness will be focused on what is going on behind you and you will be less able to concentrate on the tasks in hand. As far as business is concerned, staff will be less efficient/productive in such positions. In a cellular office it is usually quite simple to space-plan furniture so that the occupant has 'command of the room'.

By this I mean that the person has a good view of the door and through any windows, without having to turn around. Clearly, in an open-plan office environment it is almost inevitable that some personnel will end up with their back to a corridor. The best and simplest short-term remedy is to position a small mirror in front of you (perhaps on the edge of your PC monitor) so that you can easily see behind you. The small, circular, convex car wing mirrors are ideal as they show a wide expanse from a discreet surface area.

Editor's Comments:

Are you a Feng Shui skeptic? Do you look upon Feng Shui as "primitive superstition ill-befitting rational, progressive intellectuals in the 21st century?" Listen to what the author has to say:

Companies are viewing the office environment as a critical factor that affects staff morale, motivation and loyalty. Feng shui is becoming accepted as a valid method of bringing about real change in people's lives, with large prestigious corporations such as BUPA, Orange Telecom, Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank, British Airways and Virgin Airlines, employing feng shui consultants on a regular basis. What do these companies have in common? They are all extremely successful, very profitable and people-orientated. With salaries accounting for the largest overhead of many companies, these 'blue chips' are keen to ensure that their employees are happy and motivated in the work place, in order that they may maximise performance. Training new people and integrating them into company culture is an expensive and time-consuming business; hence by reducing staff, turnover companies are taking a significant step closer to maximising their profits. Increasingly, companies are viewing the office environment as a critical factor affecting staff morale, motivation and loyalty. Many companies, such as those mentioned above, are discovering that feng shui provides a cost-effective means of significantly improving the quality of their working environment and so ultimately enhances their success in the marketplace.

During the decade of the Nineties, the ancient Chinese art of Feng Shui gained an unexpected but welcome currency in the technologically advanced, rationalistically oriented nations of Europe and America -- the countries anthropologist Edward T. Hall referred to as "low context" societies. American TV sit-coms now feature episodes in which famous Hollywood actors engage in Feng Shui one-upsmanship.

But is Feng Shui merely the Flavor of the Month? Is it, god forbid, the Macarena? Let us hope not. Feng Shui is far too important to be adopted and discarded as just another passing fad. Feng Shui, like Accupuncture, like Chinese Herbal Medicine, like Qi Gong, like Chinese Martial Arts, like the I Ching, works. It worked in the past, and will work in the future, for the simple reason that Feng Shui is grounded in a profound understanding of the fundamental nature of the universe we inhabit. It will only stop working when Nature As We Know It stops working as we know it. As westerners begin to appreciate what an invaluable contribution the Chinese art of Feng Shui is to the environmental design profession, it is high time Chinese design professionals re-evaluated their own cultural heritage. It would be sad indeed if at the same time Westerners were acquiring a newfound respect for All Things Chinese, Chinese themselves were busy denigrating and minimizing their own historical legacy.

-- Bevin Chu

Explanation: Feng Shui For Business
Illustration: None
Author: Robert Gray
Affiliation: Feng Shui Society
Source: http://www.creativefengshui.co.uk/aboutus/body_aboutus.html
Publication Date: 2003
Original Language: English
Editor: Bevin Chu, Registered Architect