Workplace curators

Implicit in Sustainability and longevity is the idea that workplaces need curators, as part of their sustainability framework.

The task of the curator (among other things) is to blend new and retained items in a way that supports the narrative of how the organisation is evolving. There is a sustainability narrative, how we reuse, repair and remodel old things, but there is also a cultural narrative, how a workplace and organisation evolve continually, balancing the old and the new, rather than freezing for ten years and then needing radical change to catch up.

Facilities management has tended to focus on maintenance and functional change, within what currently exists - the new copier or task chairs, the workgroup moves and changes. Curator is a cultural job, beyond the utilitarian.

It asks:

• Who are we and where are we going?
• How do we move that way with what we’ve got?
• When we replace, do we do like-for-like or something different?
• What new things do we need, and how will they evolve in turn beyond answering one need?
• What makes a workplace culture readable and ownable?
• How do we evolve ‘tradition’ so that people feel grounded during the process of change?
• How do we reduce the need for disorientating 'great leaps forward', or at least bring everyone to that point together and prepared?