Do you also want a healthier and more productive working environment? The solution is easier than you think: go green!
Luckily we pay more and more attention to green at home. That’s why it’s such a shame that green at the office is still often forgotten. Not only because we spend so much time there, but even more because the lack of greenery is a killer for your productivity and health.
Plants are productivity boosters
Are you exhausted after a long day at work and do you have the feeling that your to do list is only getting longer? Surround yourself with plants at your desk. Plants have a positive effect on productivity. According to studies form the universities of Cardiff, Exeter, Queensland and Groningen, productivity in the workplace can increase by 15% when in the company of plants and greenery. If there are plants at the office, people complete tasks at a faster rate without having a damaging impact on the quality of work.
Why? If you are working in an environment where there’s something that makes you happy (plants) you work better, according to the researchers. Besides that plants have a positive effect on your concentration levels because they reduce noise by 8%.
A green environment makes healthy
Your boss would be happy at this point, having a more productive employee. However, there are more benefits of plants at the office. They also have a positive effect on your mental and physical health.
Green = relaxing
You’re probably familiar with the relax feeling after a hike in the forest. Green at your workplace has the same relaxing and stress reducing effect. People feel 15% less stressed and 17% more relaxed in a green environment compared with an environment without plants.
Green = purifying
Fatigue, headaches, irritated eyes and respiratory tract. Symptoms you might recognize when you come home after a long day at work. Plants can reduce these physical complaints, making you happier and also more productive. I almost hear you think: ‘how’? This has to do with the fact that plants do more than being beautiful, they purify the air!
Natural air purification
The air quality in offices is usually not optimal and sometimes up to 5 to 10 times more polluted as outside by poor ventilation and the harmful substances emitted by printers, copiers and air conditioning. These harmful substances often cause, in combination with a low humidity, symptoms such as burning eyes, headaches and fatigue. A downer for your overall health and productivity. Since the 1980s there has been done much research regarding this so-called Sick building syndrome, mainly by NASA.
Plants, such as Anthurium, purify our air through the mini mouths in the leaves, using bacteria in the ground and through their roots. They turn the dirty substances that they take out of the air into food for themselves and we get a clean air, oxygen and better humidity in return since plants release water when they breathe. The plant happy, we happy!
As a result of a cleaner air physical complains will fade away. You might recognize this positive effect of a clean air from a trip to the mountains. As a result you feel better and your have more energy and therefore more productive.
Convinced that a green office is a must for your health and productivity, but no idea how to apply it? Monday you can learn everything about office planting 2.0.
