Partnership with Hassell, Lendlease, and Schiavello will support organisations build healthier, fit for purpose workspaces

The COVID-19 pandemic — which has forced many employers to rethink the design of their offices and other workspaces — has amplified the need for effective workspace design and recognition of how critical this can be in supporting employee health, wellbeing, safety, and productivity.

Whilst the pandemic has been a catalyst for organisations to transform workspace design, evaluating workspaces and workplaces programs to assess and measure the impact that can be generated has been a passion of the course’s lead academic, Associate Professor Lucio Naccarella, for some time.

Speaking about the course and partnership, Associate Professor Lucio Naccarella, shared that “the motivation behind creating this course was to assist professionals, such as individuals working in people and culture or leadership roles, to quickly upskill and understand evaluation methodology which they can apply to identify how workspaces impact employee wellbeing.  Co-designing the course with market-leading brands such as Hassell, Lendlease and Schiavello enriches the course for participants and gives them exposure to current industry best practices around using evaluation to transform workplace design".

All three co-design partners have collaborated with the University of Melbourne before.

Hassell, an international leader in architecture, landscape architecture, interior design, and urban design, was the principal consultant and architect for the University of Melbourne’s 6-star green Western Edge Biosciences building. The building is an active and flexible learning environment designed specifically to cater to students in Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics, and Medicine.

Lendlease is a globally integrated real estate and investment group with core expertise in shaping cities and creating strong and connected communities. In partnership with the university, they designed and constructed Melbourne Connect, the new centrepiece of Melbourne’s Innovation Districts strategy.

In working with Schiavello, the University of Melbourne leveraged its long history of creating world-class working and living environments and expertise in the property, construction, and furniture industries to create a research space for the School of Engineering called the Giblin Eunson library and three new floors for the Business and Economics building.