RAPID7

SPACE PLANNING CONSULTANCY FOR GLOBAL CYBER SECURITY TECH GIANT.

SCOPE: SOCIAL DISTANCING SPACE PLANNING
SECTOR: CYBER SECURITY / TECHNOLOGY

The COVID-19 pandemic changed the way we worked in 2020 and most likely, forever. Large companies have had to navigate their global real estate very carefully to ensure safety of their employees, whilst remaining efficient and productive.

We were approached by the team at Rapid7 after working with them to deliver their office in Belfast. The brief was to support the Real Estate team in space planning all of their offices globally to 6ft/2m social distancing regulations.

Together we developed a design strategy to enable their workforce to safely return to the office, while ensuring that staff were able to move throughout the space using one-way circulation systems and leaving clear access routes. This involved firstly clarifying the numbers of people Rapid7 could safely have within their buildings at any one time, whilst maintaining a social distance from one another.

This led us to using designated ‘groupings’ of desks (reflected in the colour changes in the below content) that could be safely occupied, as long as the others were not. Each desk grouping would last for one week, so there was a rotation of all employees having the opportunity to work from the office if they chose to do so.

Worksettings other than desks were also analysed to clarify how many people could safely be in that space, for example meeting rooms and open-plan breakout areas. Then circulation routes clarified for entry and exit. In some areas, alternative furniture layouts were created to enable safely-distanced interactions.

Together, we created a workable solution which was able to be then implemented across the company’s real estate portfolio in the below locations:

• USA / Canada: Austin, Boston, Virginia, LA, San Francisco & Toronto.

• Europe: Belfast, Dublin, Galway, Munich, Paris & Reading.

• Asia-Pacific / Australia: Melbourne, Singapore & Tokyo.

Rapid7 have been able to keep their employees safe by closely following the local guidelines and restrictions by country and implementing the above design strategy where safely possible.