Background 

Interaction, a workspace design firm with a 30-year history, faced the challenge of preserving its culture amid rapid growth and the shift to hybrid work. Their mission: banish boring offices.

To build a lasting culture, Interaction identified core values intrinsic to everyone through an employee survey: collaboration, commitment, and creativity. Employees, now called ‘Actioneers,’ embody these values. The challenge was then to streamline onboarding for newcomers, give employees a voice and enhance well-being in a workspace people love.

Approach 

Employee Voice

Interaction established the Ministry of Action (MOA), a group of individuals who volunteered to consistently improve workplace culture and team spirit.

The MOAs have introduced quarterly surveys, which measure employee wellbeing. They created Commitment Days, allowing each Actioneer 2 paid days annually to volunteer for charity, with over 40 Commitment Days being used in the past 10 months. An anonymous channel has also been set up where staff pose questions that the SLT commit to answer at monthly meetings.

Onboarding

Interaction improved the onboarding experience for new starters, ensuring the culture is present from the get-go. A comprehensive handbook now guides new starters through everything from how the taps work to hot-desking etiquette, whilst MOA pairs newcomers with a buddy from a different department for their first month, fostering a supportive environment for questions without fear of judgement.

Happy Employees

Interaction work hard to prioritise employee wellbeing, happiness and job satisfaction, utilising MOA surveys feedback. This effort includes weekly bar nights in the office bar, regular ‘Beyond The Bar’ activities – from board games to boxing, and a weekend AGM which is a chance for everyone to reconnect. This year’s trip included a samba workshop, ferret racing and full-band karaoke.

Destination office

Interaction have recently moved into a purpose-built office that staff love working in. Hot-desking over flexible workstations reduces siloing, and the high-end coffee machine is particularly popular. Weekly face-to-face touchpoints encourage people into the office – smoothies on Mondays, internal learning sessions on Wednesdays, and free Friday bar nights.

Outcome

The project saw Interaction’s headcount grow by about 25%, while establishing a cohesive and scalable culture across all touchpoints. New recruits experience streamlined onboarding, ensuring a quick sense of belonging. Actioneers have a voice in the business and information flow is quick and transparent, with questions, even challenging ones, addressed at monthly leadership meetings. HR data indicates positive trends: increasing quarterly survey responses, impressive onboarding feedback, and decreasing attrition and turnover rates. Relationships among Actioneers are strengthened through diverse social and developmental activities.
What better way to describe Interaction’s culture than by asking the team? Here’s how they’d describe Interaction in one word:
Dynamic, creative, community, fun, thriving, unique, resilient, inspiring.
What more could you want?