Thanks to popular culture, you probably have a very particular image of the world of trading: an image of young men shouting frantically on the phone while following trading developments on a series of screens. It all fosters the impression of a stress-stricken work environment.
Research acknowledged by WORKTECH Academy has found that the trading sphere’s tense atmosphere could be putting employees’ health and decision-making at risk. However, there is evidence that if the work environment is loosened up, these worrying issues could be relieved.
Is the trading floor itself really causing stress?
A report from architecture company Gensler, which conducted research supported by dealer room furniture firm Erich Keller, has described workplace stress as being influenced by the employees’ environment.
Trading floors are unvaried and linear compared to other corporate settings, but Gensler’s research has envisioned how, with tighter control over the trading environment and changes to both sensory stimuli and behavioural ergonomics, traders could be spared much stress.
A controlled workspace could increase rational decisions
With a flexible workspace, you would be at liberty to alter it when and as you see fit. This could prove an especially strong boon in trading, where a rather liberal space can lead traders to overestimate their control over the market and as a result, worsen the risks they take.
It logically follows, then, that if the leader of a trading company tightly controls their employees’ workspace, rationality will more strongly feed into these traders’ decisions.
The end of an error
Naturally, every business has an interest in cutting out errors in its workforce. However, many businesses – including those in trading – might not have realised that even poor posture in their personnel could lead to inefficient decision-making.
According to research, by adopting proper posture, traders could be rewarded with improvements in their cognitive function and emotional disposition, potentially meaning fewer mistakes.
Flexibility can afford many different sizes to fit everyone
While flexibility seems to promise various advantages for traders, you should probably be wary of simply introducing an open-plan layout in a bid to inject flexibility into your workspace.
This is because, despite the belief that open-plan offices can encourage collaboration and thus productivity, 30% of workers are still introverts, as Real Business points out. Hence, they might not reap the productivity benefits that you would understandably expect to see in extroverted staff.
In the financial sector, over two-thirds of working hours are spent on tasks that rely on concentration, and therefore privacy and quiet. The real trick is to allow traders to flexibly adapt as their corporate responsibilities change.
‘Space as a service’ is expected to go mainstreamProperty Week has outlined various reasons why the availability of flexible workspace looks set to grow. Therefore, your trading firm could benefit from capitalising on this, such as by booking serviced offices. With such offices from the UK-based provider BE Offices, even the number of desks can be scaled from one right up to one hundred for a busy, but also unusually relaxed trading environment.
