Check Out One of Turkey’s Largest Fleet Leasing Offices

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Chair of the Month

Natalie Grasso Cockrell
Natalie Grasso Cockrell
Natalie is a Workplace Consultant at Herman Miller and the former Editor of Work Design Magazine. She’s currently based in Pittsburgh.

Derindere was founded in 1998 and, over the past fifteen years, has become one of Turkey’s largest fleet leasing companies, with over 26,000 vehicles in its charge. By early 2013, the Istanbul-based office could no longer keep up with its growth, and in December 2013, Derindere unveiled its new 27,000 square foot office space, designed by TeamFores. The design team’s main goal was to create more social space, as well as smaller areas for activity-based work. Read on for a Q&A with a rep from TeamFores.

All photos courtesy of TeamFores.
All photos by Mehmet Ince, courtesy of TeamFores.

What was the old Derindere Fleet Leasing office like and how is the new one different?

The old Derindere Fleet office offered a conventional working environment for employees. They met the same people in the same places during the daily work routine. The design of the office and furniture didn’t refer to any terms of corporate identity. The new design includes specially designed furniture for the corporation. More social places, common working tables, and mobile personal caisson units offer the ability to choose different working places according to the task they are working on. This [has made for] better social communication and a healthier environment for working.

How has the new office shifted the culture and employee experience in the new space?

Working in a better social environment contributed the work motivation and increased the productivity. The new design changed the working habits of today’s employees with clever and simple solutions. The rooms are conceived as multi-functional units so as to answer to as many needs as possible, thus diminishing the space needed for a project of this size while leaving the possibility to open up spaces to new potential functions.

Another element that can be considered as a contribution to office social life consists of the prayer rooms. Prayer rooms have been conceived as meditation rooms open to people of all religions.

We have been working in a very old fashioned and uncomfortable office space. Now I can see that not only has the way we worked changed, our world has also totally changed.

Did TeamFores provide any sort of change management advice to Derindere as they transitioned into the new office?

Bringing employees together in common areas and having transparency even in management rooms, brought out the necessity of project’s educational and social responsibility dimension. Thus it can be said that the main advice is being aware and of our surroundings and respect them while creating a living/working environment for ourselves.

What kind of reaction have the employees had to the new office?

The Chairman of the Board didn’t see any of the architectural phases until everything was all done. He was shocked and surprised and the very first words came out of his mouth were, “We have been working in a very old fashioned and uncomfortable office space, now I can see that not only the way we work has changed, our world has also totally changed.”

Any interesting acoustical elements?

The office takes maximum advantage of cutting edge technology, with automation systems monitoring mechanical conditions and lighting according to the number of users and users scenarios so as to minimize unnecessary energy consumption. While avoiding needless use of equipment, this well balanced use of energy also results in increased acoustic comfort. Expanded metal ceiling panels and absorbing treatments behind them also reduced the background noise.

Tell us more about choosing the furniture and materials for the space.

All furniture used in the project was newly designed so as to answer present and foreseeable needs, taking account of the Derindere Company’s sixteen years of experience as well as its growth potential. For this reason we can really call this project a Haute-coutre project. The furniture was designed and created following eight months of serious R&D work and without overlooking the project’s educational and social responsibility dimension. It relieves users from being bound to a given room or desk, creating a free and holistic office space and environment. The use of the furniture will lead the user to move around, thus avoiding a routine and stationary working environment. From working desks to meeting lounges, printer units to moveable caissons, waste recycling units to file storage systems, everything was specifically designed and created for this project.

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