8
CONCLUSIONS
In the end more similarities than dissimilarities showed up in comparing prioritized aspects in
Finland and the Netherlands. In both countries opportunities to concentrate rated significantly
higher than privacy. In Finland 55% of the respondents marked opportunities to concentrate as
one of three most important aspects versus 22% that marked opportunities to communicate as
one of the most important issues; In the Netherlands we found percentages of 37% versus 24%.
In Finland, privacy is ranked higher on the list of most important aspects than in the Netherlands,
but in both countries much less respondents marked privacy in their top three of most important aspects (Finland 21%, the Netherlands 12%). Though open plan offices are often criticised
because of lack of privacy, privacy is not really the issue. What employees find very important is
being able to concentrate. The currently widely applied multispace offices seem to be a nice
compromise in order to cope with both the need for concentration and the need for
communication, whereas both concepts can enable the highest ranked issue i.e. functional and
comfortable workplaces.
Furthermore this comparison shows that more in-depth studies are needed in order to be able to
explain similarities and dissimilarities in prioritized aspects in different context, including
measuring a number of organisation and employee characteristics as well.