How accounting firm Hall Chadwick reimagined its workplace to match its purpose

In today’s rapidly changing market, finding your purpose can be the key to standing out and remaining relevant. Purpose-driven organisations are known for having a competitive advantage, with a clear understanding of their reason for existing and a commitment to making a positive impact on the world.

As a workplace strategist in Australia with over 20 years of experience, I have seen first-hand the impact that a clearly articulated purpose can have on an organisation’s success. The purpose of an organisation is the reason it exists beyond making money. It is more about ‘why’ it exists, and the positive impact it wishes to make on the world. An organisation’s purpose gives an organisation a greater meaning, an outcome that employees can feel fulfilled by, and a sense that they are contributing to making the world a better place.

Making the purpose tangible for employees is about connecting it to what they do every day, making it real, and giving them a direct line of sight between their individual actions and that of the company. When employees understand their organisation’s purpose and how they contribute to it, they become more motivated, engaged, and productive.

While the purpose of an organisation typically starts with the founder, with growth, time, acquisitions, mergers, and generations of leadership, leaders may need to rediscover their organisation’s purpose and reconnect ‘what we do’ with ‘why we do it.’ 

Organisations can use their workplaces as an investment, a tool that aligns the organisation and their people, to motivate and enable employee performance, increase productivity, and ultimately the profitability of the company. However, before we can create an inspiring workplace, we must first reconnect with our purpose.

For organisations interested in finding their purpose, I offer the following insights:

Finding the organisation’s purpose

1. Engage with your leadership team and ask them what they believe is the organisation’s purpose, the “why” of what you do. While you are likely to find differing opinions and stances on priorities, you will also likely find an emerging story, a commonality that weaves itself through each person’s perspective. Capture these words, phrases and thoughts and craft them into a statement that reflects the essence of the story.

2. Communicate this story back to your leadership team, invite feedback, and gauge how it lands and their body language as they receive it. Using this power of collective creation, iterate, evolve, and improve until you have a statement that feels right for your organisation. Connecting with your organisation’s purpose can solidify your identity.

3. You will likely find that this will uncover other aspirations for positive impact and social good, solidifying the organisation’s identity. This can be a powerful tool for attracting and retaining employees who share the same values and beliefs as the organisation.

4. When organisations have a clear purpose, it can serve as a guiding principle for decision-making, help attract and retain talent, and build customer loyalty. It gives an organisation a sense of direction and inspires employees to work towards a shared goal.

The story of Hall Chadwick

My client, Hall Chadwick, is an accounting firm with a history that stretches back four decades, with strong ties to Longreach in Western Queensland. For years the organisation occupied an office that spread over two non-contiguous levels, a space that bore no relationship to who they were as a company nor their clients’ experience of doing business with them.

Working closely with several of the directors from Hall Chadwick we developed a strategic vision for their new workspace that embraced the company’s heritage within the context of an exciting future. In 2016, with its lease expiry imminent, Hall Chadwick’s existing workspace was problematic. Fifteen years of business growth had spread the staff across two separate and disparate floors, resulting in an unsuitable fit-out and a siloed culture.

Hall Chadwick’s space did not signify anything unique or different about the business — nothing that would make it stand out from any other accounting practice. The space was a rabbit warren of high-screened workstations. Offices hugged the perimeter windows, and mounds of files sat stacked on desks, in corridors, and in an extensive “filing” area. The kitchen was a tiny, windowless room with limited seating space. The main reception area featured a free-standing desk, four single armchairs, and a logo hung on the wall; the floor was carpeted in standard-issue “landlord” carpet, and the chairs were upholstered in a red maroon that reflected the branding colours. The office space was simple, traditional, and “did the job.”

Reimagining the workspace

The brief emerged as an opportunity to reinforce Hall Chadwick’s culture, provide a workspace that was flexible enough to support the company’s evolving operational needs, and a space that clients felt comfortable visiting, which wasn’t ostentatious. A space to communicate the deep, rich history that Hall Chadwick has with Western Queensland, and to tell the story of their agricultural client base residing in this part of Australia that trusts them with their business, spanning generations. We also wanted to communicate the strong values that underpin the business operations of Hall Chadwick: mateship, welcoming hospitality, and that strong country essence that says: “We’re in this together. And when times get tough, we’ve got your back.”

Uncovering the story and the brand experience of Hall Chadwick enabled us to design the workplace to embrace the company’s rich history and desire to establish long-term relationships with clients, where they are warmly welcomed and invited into the business. This brand experience translated through a complete sensory experience.

Hall Chadwick’s new workplace embodies elements of rural life by incorporating earthy materials, rich, deep colours, and textural finishes. Every aspect of the design, from the alfresco patio structure over the kitchen to the training room furnishings, subtly reflects the company’s origins in Western Queensland. By infusing the desired brand experience into the built environment, Hall Chadwick has created a space that reaffirms its culture. It elicits a feeling that draws in those it appeals to. It is a filter that attracts the right team members, clients, and partners. Hall Chadwick is leading and enabling its culture by infusing its brand into every facet of its built environment.

Reconnecting with your organisation’s purpose is an essential step towards creating an inspiring workplace that motivates employees, increases productivity, and generates more revenue for the company. Understanding your purpose informs the brand experience that you want people to have when they do business with you. 

Engage with your leadership team, uncover the experience, communicate the story back to them, iterate, evolve, and improve until you have a statement that feels right for your organisation. Doing so, will solidify a clear sense of direction, attract and retain talent, and ultimately stand out in a crowded market.

Melissa Marsden is a workplace dynamics strategist and the author of The Next Workplace: Designing Dynamic Environments that Inspire Human Potential. She is also the founder and director of COMUNiTI.