Designing a thoughtful workspace takes a lot of intention. Matt Mohamed, Sr. Director of Global Real Estate & Workplace at Verkada, explains the art of designing workspaces that foster meaningful connections and community among employees. Join us as we discuss the role of fun, observation, and collaboration in shaping workspaces that truly resonate with the needs and desires of those who inhabit them.
In this episode, Matt Mohamed, Sr. Director of Global Real Estate & Workplace at Verkada, explains the art of designing workspaces that foster connections and community among employees. We’ll explore the concept of creating "third places" within the office environment, spaces that naturally facilitate interaction and collaboration.
From observing how employees use their workspace to understanding the importance of physical experience in design, Matt uncovers the methodology behind crafting environments that promote engagement and well-being. Join us as we discuss the role of fun, observation, and collaboration in shaping workspaces that truly resonate with the needs and desires of those who inhabit them.
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“One of the big things for us is creating space within our space where people can connect and commune together. And we try to create space that allows for this to happen naturally or organically. And so the concept of a third place within the workspace is at the forefront of how we design and how we allow people to kind of interact with each other in the office.”
“A lot of our design comes from observation. And so we will sort of observe how employees actually use the space that we create or how they're using their existing space, and then find a way to insert something that would allow them to interact and serve as a third place for the employees.”
“It's hard for folks who don't live in a world of creating space to articulate what they want from a space. And so we take a combination of people's comments and then our observations of how they actually use the spaces we create. And then we come to conclusions on what it is that's missing or what we think people could really benefit from. And so it's the whole team that does a lot of observing.”
“We do believe that in person observation is like the easiest way to really see how people are interacting. Cameras are really good for maintaining order, operation, and security in a space, but if you want to create space, you kind of have to live inside of it. Um, I mean, even when we're planning for a new office or a new lab or something, we have to go live in the space physically, you know, no matter where it is in the world in order to really be able to take something that's, uh, on a plan set in 2D and create something meaningful out of it. You have to, you have to first experience it yourself.”
“In most good designs, it's a collaboration and there's constant contributions from who, in this case, who are our clients in a traditional setting of real estate development, these would be our clients. And in this case, they're actually our peers or co-workers. And so it's like getting to know them and understanding what it is that they want to offer and then like making that come to life for them. That is how we work. “
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00:12 - Quick Hits
01:49 - About Verkada
04:20 - Thriving in spaces
05:29 - Hiring and retention experience
11:09 - Inviting collaboration
20:43 - Knowing what to change
24:34 - Psychology of design
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More about Office Libations
[00:00:27] Claude Burns: Welcome to Office Libations Unwrapped. I'm Claude Burns, and today I'm joined by our guest, Matt Mohamed, Senior Director of Global Real Estate and Workplace at Verkada. Matt, how are you doing today?
[00:00:36] Matt Mohamed: Happy to be here.
[00:00:37] Claude Burns: Perfect. all right. Welcome to our quick hits segment. Uh, all right, Matt, coffee or tea? All
[00:00:43] Matt Mohamed: Coffee. Always.
[00:00:45] Claude Burns: Okay. What, you got a favorite brand?
[00:00:46] Matt Mohamed: I mean, it used to be trouble coffee from San Francisco. It's closed now. Um, yeah, for a long time now, that was, that was it.
[00:00:53] Claude Burns: All right. What about your go to work, snack or drink?
[00:00:57] Matt Mohamed: Also coffee.
[00:00:59] Claude Burns: Oh, okay. A lot of coffee these days.
[00:01:00] Matt Mohamed: Tends to be the snack too.
[00:01:02] Claude Burns: Uh, how many cups a day are we going?
[00:01:03] Matt Mohamed: Usually just like three espressos.
[00:01:06] Claude Burns: Okay. Uh, that'll get you.
[00:01:08] Matt Mohamed: But nice, nice and spread out.
[00:01:10] Claude Burns: Yeah. I imagine you're running around a lot, so that's good for you. Um, you're retired. Money is no object. Where do you live?
[00:01:18] Matt Mohamed: probably my hometown, Santa Cruz. I was lucky enough to grow up in a place where most people vacation. So, kind of an easy, kind of an easy segue for me.
[00:01:28] Claude Burns: Okay, perfect. Um, what's the best thing you've eaten recently?
[00:01:32] Matt Mohamed: That's a good question. Probably Damn Fine Pizza in San Francisco in the outer sunset.
[00:01:37] Claude Burns: Last book you've read?
[00:01:38] Matt Mohamed: The last book I finished was recently The Italians by Luigi Barsini.
[00:01:45] Claude Burns: Okay, uh, haven't heard of that. I'll have to, have to write that one down to add to my audible.
[00:01:48] Matt Mohamed: It's very good. Very.
[00:01:49] Claude Burns: Um, what's, what's your favorite historical figure dead or alive?
[00:01:55] Matt Mohamed: Bob Marley.
[00:01:56] Claude Burns: Bob Marley. Do you see the recent movie?
[00:01:59] Matt Mohamed: I have not yet.
[00:02:00] Claude Burns: Okay. All right. So something to do on the weekend.
[00:02:03] Matt Mohamed: I know. I have to check it out.
[00:02:04] Claude Burns: We're going to move into kind of the learning a little bit more about Verkata and what you do there. So for our audience, can you kind of explain a little bit briefly what Verkata does and what your role at the company is?
[00:02:14] Matt Mohamed: absolutely. Yeah, so Verkata basically is in the business of, it's a hardware and software company that makes building systems and security systems for buildings. Um, company started with Uh, kind of revolutionizing CCTV for folks, and moved into access control, alarms, environmental sensors, and basically our, our charter is anything that helps a building run, Verkata makes. Recently we published or, or launched, our guest app, which basically allows people to like check in and out of buildings as they come and go. Um, and then also, uh, mail delivery system. So shipping receiving platform and all of this integrates with all of all the products integrate together. So access camera, incorporates into every single product we make, um, to help buildings run.
[00:03:05] Claude Burns: That's awesome. And what do you do at Verkata?
[00:03:07] Matt Mohamed: I basically run a In house real estate development team. So our team is responsible for the search and acquisition of property. So leasing offices or lab spaces or warehouse. Whatever the, whatever the business needs. And then taking those spaces and designing and building them in house. And then running the facilities when they're open. Including like environmental health safety concerns. And just like anything that has to do with employees coming and going from a space.
[00:03:38] Claude Burns: That's awesome. And you're at what, about 15 locations, 15 offices around the world? Uh,
[00:03:45] Matt Mohamed: 15 globally. Yeah,
[00:03:46] Claude Burns: That's awesome. Do you have a favorite office or can you not say?
[00:03:49] Matt Mohamed: I probably shouldn't. I think Salt Lake City is one of my favorites right now. Um, the team took, uh, about 8 9 months to really redevelop a space in Salt Lake City in the Sugar House neighborhood and a lot of the items that We're put into that office, we're done in house, um, literally with the two hands of our team members.
[00:04:10] And so, very proud of, like, the product that they put out there, um, and the employees that are now living in the space seem to really enjoy it, so that's always a success for us.
[00:04:21] Claude Burns: Yeah. I think your team, and I think we'll get into it later, has a unique kind of way of thinking about building out spaces for, for your teams, um, a lot in house, a lot more in house than I think others do. Um, but, but when you think about like the employee life cycle of an employee at Verkada and creating employee experiences, what are the things that you guys think about to make sure your teams are happy and successful and thrive in your spaces?
[00:04:44] Yeah.
[00:04:45] Matt Mohamed: Yeah. I mean, I think one of the, one of the big things for us is creating space within our space where people can connect and commune together. And we try to create space that allows for this to happen naturally or organically. And so the concept of like a third place within the workspace is very kind of at the forefront of how we design and how we, and how we allow people to kind of like interact with each other in this, in the office.
[00:05:12] Obviously we create office space that has desking and conference rooms and all the, all the usual, but in between all of those meetings and heads down work in your own space, we try to create areas where people can really come together and they might even be from the same team, but have kind of an impromptu conversation that could just be largely social and give people a mental break from whatever they're working on.
[00:05:34] Claude Burns: And I think you guys are pretty unique in that your focus is really in office employees and team members, correct?
[00:05:41] You said something that was interesting to me when you thought about sort of what team members you're attracting and hiring at Verkata. You sort of said that they're the, you know, the startup mentality. Can you kind of shed a little bit more light on what you meant by that?
[00:05:53] Matt Mohamed: Yeah. I think, um, you know, there's, there's one of the hot topics of conversation these days is, uh, remote versus hybrid versus in office. And, um, I think largely the search for talent. For startup companies hasn't changed that much. It actually has less to do about where people want to work and rather like the mindset that they're in, um, and that they want to be a part of something that's very dynamic and growing and that's constantly changing every day and that type of an environment and that type of, uh, a growing business sort of lends itself to be healthier and better served by an in.
[00:06:28] in person community of employees.
[00:06:31] Claude Burns: Okay. Makes sense. Um, when you, when you think about those like third spaces, right? Um, that are breaking up your employee's day, how do you like, you know, tell people like, Hey, you should go use this lounge or this sort of special space. Like what are some of the ways you're, you're building that into your employee communications?
[00:06:48] Matt Mohamed: I mean, I, I would like to think that everything that we send out, people read, but I know that's not true. And so a lot of, and so a lot of, uh, our, um, kind of design comes from observation. And so we will like sort of observe how employees actually use space that we create or how they're using their existing space, and then find a way to insert something that would allow them to interact and serve as a third place for the employees.
[00:07:14] For example, we, we've created several lounge spaces in our office, and these are like spread out on our second floor and on our, on our roof, and they're in locations where employees may travel through as they're coming and going for meetings, or they're like on the, in the example of the roof, they're like an opportunity to get outside, but still be In the building, and it's a very accessible way to sort of like, get some fresh air and like really engage with whoever might be there. And so we had to make that like a very desirable destination, so to speak, so that it drove people to that location. And then when these spaces are open, we have to observe how people actually use them. And then if they don't work, then we have to kind of go back to the drawing board and figure out like what people will use.
[00:07:58] Claude Burns: Yeah, and I think during our initial conversation, you sort of mentioned the makeup of your team being very different than your typical sort of global workforce, uh, uh, real estate, you know, company sort of team. Can you kind of talk to me about how that gives you guys an advantage in creating spaces and also figuring out if they didn't work and sort of pivoting away from the expected use into a better use?
[00:08:20] Matt Mohamed: The way that we have our team structured is very unique.We have the typical people on the team that, um, are managing the workplace in general or like me who's focused a lot on like real estate transactions, um, as the principal. But then we have an entire development team of project managers, architects, designers, and even carpenters, electricians, etc. And so we are able to actually physically do a lot of the work in house ourselves. And so the, the design work happens as a collaboration between a few of us and then the actual building can happen much faster and much smoother than it would if we were constantly outsourcing. And of course, with like large scale jobs, of course we use, um, You know, general contractor partners, architecture firms, et cetera.
[00:09:05] But we really do have the ability to take and kind of iterate on the products that we create together in house. And, um, it kind of creates a more custom ability for us to even do like, for instance, we did last summer and ice cream pop up where we basically made, we fabricated a really cool little, like, table that had, that was pink and it looked like ice cream was dripping off of it. And we basically themed this entire zone with vinyl on the floor and it was all done in house. And then it had ice cream freezers in it that were stocked every day. And there was like a, another place where people could just show up.
[00:09:41] Um, and they would show up, you know, randomly, usually in the afternoons, and there would be people from all over the building, it was sort of central in the building near our, our central staircase, and there were folks from all different floors, all different teams kind of coming together to experience that, and so we did that for, I think, three months, for the actual, like, summer months, and then, um, and then it left, and so we tried to Even do very small installations, uh, or activations of the space like that to really, like, keep people moving and keep them thinking about, um, what, what the space has to offer.
[00:10:12] Claude Burns: That's so awesome. What space are you like most proud of or, you know, do you think is most unique?
[00:10:18] Matt Mohamed: I, I mean, the staircase is, is my favorite. Um, it, it was a, it was a pretty long and in depth collaboration. Um, with Danielle on my team and she was, she was really the one that led that project and it really provides a central space for the employees to come and go from all of their meetings and all of their work throughout the day.
[00:10:43] It is, it is actually central. It sits in the very center of two buildings that we stitched together. And so it is a, it is a very successful, um, example of what we're talking about today, where it allows people to naturally convene in a way that, um, they wouldn't otherwise, if it didn't exist, if they were forced to kind of like be spread out to all of the egress stairwells in the building, they wouldn't meet the same people and they wouldn't have the same conversations.
[00:11:10] They also happen, the staircase also happens to be adjacent to all of the micro kitchens. So on each floor, there's a micro kitchen that corresponds with the landing of the central staircase. And so it is like, it's where you run into everyone. It's like a, a huge water fountain, so to speak, for the building.
[00:11:26] Claude Burns: Yeah. And why do you guys feel that that it's so important to have those collisions, um, with people from different departments or people that, you know, they may not meet otherwise?
[00:11:36] Matt Mohamed: I mean, I think it's important anytime you're trying to create something, which is what our business is doing, but especially in a startup environment where we are literally constantly developing new product lines, and we are redeveloping, we're developing the way that business communicates with each other. We're writing policy and procedure on a daily basis. We're really, um, you know, refining and standing up this business that's already been, like, very successful. And I think that we really believe that those, those moments are kind of, like, paramount to our success in doing so.
[00:12:11] Claude Burns: Have you had anything that has sort of come out of sort of a meeting, sort of, or a chance meeting between two employees that you're aware of?
[00:12:19] Matt Mohamed: I mean, I think it happens every day, to be honest. I think, um, one thing that I, I know from humans in general is that, like, if they, if they don't have an opportunity to interact, then they won't. And, um, I often, when I walk through the building, hear people saying, Oh, I haven't seen you in a long time. haven't run into anyone from your floor in a while. And you kind of hear this, like, Continually and so people basically are constantly forced to interact in a way just by their natural like path of travel through the space.
[00:12:48] Claude Burns: Yeah, I want to, I want to touch on one space that I thought was really, really interesting. You mentioned it earlier, but I want to kind of dig into it. I think it's your second floor, sort of speakeasy, sort of sales, uh, president's club, or can you kind of talk, uh, about, you know, what, what it takes to get into that space?
[00:13:05] Matt Mohamed: Basically we have a secret room so to speak so it's at the end of a hallway and there's a bookcase and it's there's a access control reader that's hidden behind. A panel in the wall, and so you have to know where the reader is and scan it with your phone or a badge and then the bookcase pops open and then you're kind of taken into this like really cool, um, speakeasy lounge type environment.
[00:13:29] There's a pool table and couches and there's like a beverage fridge and big TVs and a fireplace even in it. And so it kind of creates this very like comfortable environment where, uh, they, you know, there's different sales incentives that are run and they kind of like continually modify access to the space, um, or, or who's on the list to be able to access the space.
[00:13:51] It changes all the time. And so it's kind of a cool way to, um, provide an incentive for folks to, um, reach their goals, whatnot, and then they can go use this exclusive room and then it kind of like moves around the whole company or team so that folks get a chance to do it. Um,
[00:14:07] Claude Burns: Yeah. I mean,
[00:14:08] Matt Mohamed: been a very successful program.
[00:14:10] Claude Burns: you know, people always like access to spaces that they can't usually get access to. Um, so I, I could totally see like that being like, uh, a reward that probably like is overvalued compared to anything else. Just be like, Oh, I, my badge works in this
[00:14:23] Matt Mohamed: exactly. I
[00:14:25] Claude Burns: Um, that's great. You seem to like to do a lot of things that are fun. We've kind of talked about the speakeasy, the ice cream, you know, social sort of space that you kind of built out of air. How do you think that fun creates a better, like, work environment? Like, why have fun at work?
[00:14:41] Matt Mohamed: It comes back to people feeling like they're a part of some kind of a community. Um, and that extends not just inside or like extends outside of our space. We have a program where after three o'clock, you can take three people from the office and go have, um, you know, a snack or drinks on the company out in the environment around our office space.
[00:15:05] So we, you know, we're in an urban environment in the old part of downtown San Mateo, an old Bay area, downtown, really cool with lots of little shops, restaurants, whatnot. And so we really, and we have a walkup building inside just right in the middle of all of that. Um, and so, you know, and a lot of our, we are two blocks or so from Caltrain and a lot of our team take Caltrain to work, and so it's like a really cool way for us to kind of like, be a part of this community around us as people are coming and going from the office and give us a chance to kind of. Yeah, meet people in the community and be a part of something that's larger than what our life was before we got to work.
[00:15:44] Claude Burns: Right. That's so, it's so interesting that it's not just we want employees to, to gather and meet in our space and sort of our controlled environment, but also we want you to go out into the community and, you know, spend a little bit of money, uh, and, and get some time away from, away from work where, you know, some of that downtime, you know, you're, you're out with coworkers at the restaurant or bar, it feels a little different than if you're sitting, uh, 20 feet from your desk, um, having that downtime. What was sort of the inspiration behind that program? That's kind of the first I've, I've heard of something like that.
[00:16:17] Matt Mohamed: when I got to Verkata it was very clear that our co founders, as well as my boss, the CFO, they all really believed that San Mateo was a great place to work in general, to have a work environment. And so they've held true to that. And when we were looking for space, when I first got here to expand our headquarters location, We looked at other places, um, in San Mateo, more in the outskirts of San Francisco.
[00:16:41] We looked at, um, south of San Mateo, elsewhere on the peninsula, and we really landed that they wanted to stay exactly where they had, um, a small, they already had somewhat of a presence down here and they really wanted to like, um, settle in and become a part of the community here. And so I think that's like the, the original core, um, impetus for this program. That we have just like all companies do, we have, um, employees on a lot of different schedules, depending on what areas of the country or world they work with or support.
[00:17:10] Um, and so it was an opportunity for us to create a little bit of a, um, Way for people to commune together in the afternoons when some people are transitioning toward home and some people are more like at break time in their day that they could take and like go outside, take a walk, um, support something local and, you know, have, have like a, a full experience that isn't just related to like coming, going to work and leaving. Um, but it can feel like really an incorporated part of their lives.
[00:17:40] Claude Burns: How do you decide what to build? Can you kind of walk me through that again? Um, cause I think it's pretty interesting.
[00:17:45] Matt Mohamed: a lot of what we do has to do with how we observe people using and engaging in space, um, and it, and that's what really inspires my team or gives us ideas on how we create new products or, not products, but like spaces in the future that, that maybe are, you know, incrementally more successful. We do have surveys that are sent out both at a company level and then even just specific to our team and what's going well and what isn't, and we give employees an opportunity every three months or so to kind of like rate it. Thank you. their satisfaction with workplace in general, and then also give feedback, uh, written feedback on ideas or things they would like to see different. Um, and so that's like one, that's one method, but really like our, what people ask for tends to sometimes not even be what they want, so
[00:18:36] Claude Burns: Right.
[00:18:36] Matt Mohamed: speak. It's hard for folks to, who don't live in a world of creating space to articulate what they want from a space. And so we take a combination of people's comments and then our observations of how they actually use the spaces we create. And then we come to conclusions on, on what it is that's missing or what we, what we think people could really benefit from. And so it's the whole team that does a lot of observing. of like, when we open our, our new staircase or our new, um, our kitchen where everyone eats lunch every day and there's almost a thousand people there. We really like, we, we will sit and watch for weeks at a time, like how people move through the space and how they use it and then make operational or actual structural changes to, to kind of support that, what we see.
[00:19:26] Claude Burns: Do you have like an example of a space that you kind of created and realized it was slightly off and you needed to tweak something and kind of walk, walk us through what, what you observed and how you kind of know, notice that something needs to be changed?
[00:19:37] Matt Mohamed: Yeah, that's a, that's a good one. Our cafe where everyone eats lunch every day is a good example. Um, we, we had people for a while distributed throughout the building. Um, and so we had food being served on each floor and then we had like a corresponding dining area with those, with those spaces and, um, observing that it never felt fully activated in any one given space. It was very, a bit haphazard and, and people were also a little bit confused as to which food was where. And there was a little bit of kind of like wandering going on and then we concentrated everything because luckily we have the luxury of having enough of a Kitchen to support it and enough space for people to all dine together in our which is also doubles as our all hand space and so we concentrated the program down on our first floor at the base of our staircase and It's huge.
[00:20:32] It's like it's like a completely new Uh, lunchtime at Verkata, you come in and it's, uh, it's, it's live, there's music going, there's people, like, people all over having conversations, eating, and, um, really just enjoying each other's company. The program being initially designed to be spread out through the building and then concentrating it down into one is a great example of what I mean when I say that we, like, observe and then we make that, that would be like an operational and like a furniture change to support that.
[00:21:01] Claude Burns: Right. It seems like you're very intentional about how you're using office space and how you're observing people. Are you, are you physically watching or using your cameras to make your life easier?
[00:21:10] Matt Mohamed: To be honest, our team is pretty, uh, pretty old school and we physically watch, um, you know, we, we take, yeah, we take our, our job, um, very seriously, but we also, we do believe that, um, in person observation is like the easiest way to, to really see how people are interacting. Um, cameras are really good for maintaining, like, Order, operation, security in a space, but if you want to create space, you kind of have to live inside of it. Um, I mean, even when we're planning for a new office or a new lab or something, we have to go live in the space physically, you know, no matter where it is in the world in order to really be able to take something that's, uh, on a plan set in 2D and create something meaningful out of it. You have to, you have to first experience it yourself.
[00:21:59] Claude Burns: Do you ever kind of grab someone and be like, hey, why'd you do that? Uh, and
[00:22:03] Matt Mohamed: Sure, yeah, yeah,
[00:22:04] Claude Burns: on like, that was a weird thing to do. That's not how it was designed.
[00:22:08] Matt Mohamed: Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. That's how, that's how you learn, right? And you watch everything. You even watch where people throw their trash away and where they don't, or where they, where they will pick up dirty dishes or where they won't. Um, it's It's very interesting to see like human behavior and, um, ultimately, like our goal is to create the most, you know, sort of delightful, like experience while people are on site as possible. And so in order to do that, we have to observe people and see how they truly act.
[00:22:37] Claude Burns: Yeah, I think we've all probably had that experience at a restaurant or something where we, where we look for like where, where we're supposed to go next or where the restrooms are, where the, where to throw our trash away. And we're like, wait, where do, where do I do this? And then it's like, eventually you see them fix it. Right. And then it's like, ah, it makes sense now. Um, probably because they saw a bunch of deer in headlights looking, waiting to figure out where to throw their trash away. Do your other offices sort of have a similar aesthetic and design, sort of, uh, appeal, or, or do they have sort of unique flavors in different, different cities and locales?
[00:23:11] Matt Mohamed: Yeah, the, the, our, all of our offices, um, definitely have, uh, a thread of what we've been talking about. They're sort of these core principles of how we design throughout them. And, um, we have, uh, Brooke on our team leads branded environments and she really takes and tries to sew in the brand to everything that we, that we do in our spaces.
[00:23:33] A lot of that stuff is not something that anyone would do. I would notice, but, um, it creates a sort of like subconscious thread when you're, when you're in one of our spaces. An example is, we will use, there, there's three lights on a Verkhoda camera, it's blue, you better remember this, blue, orange, and green.
[00:23:53] And, She'll use those type of neon colors, for instance, even when it comes to like, uh, there'll be a portal painted when you're walking through a doorway and she'll use some of those like kind of colors and like subtle nods to the brand throughout the space. But we, every office is completely unique. Um, in Austin, they have, instead of like a traditional Verkata logo, that's, It's a black Verkata logo with the V.
[00:24:19] They have a local muralist who's painted a mural for them that says Verkata Austin and it's in that style of the famous local Austin mural. And so that, so we allow the local team when they have an opinion of how they want to express themselves in the space, then we take that and we run with it.
[00:24:38] Claude Burns: Very cool. Um, let's talk about like kind of the psychology behind space design, because I think it's really something unique that you guys do. Like, how do you guys go about creating like a new space, right? You kind of want to do something. Can you walk me through that initial sort of light bulb moment to create these cool spaces.
[00:25:00] Matt Mohamed: There's the normal process that we go through to create space where we, the team will take an interview, whoever the stakeholders are, whether it's like certain members of the leadership team, or if it's a, if it's a local leader who's going to be running that office per se. We will take and interview them about like their wants, dreams, desires, and, and really how they want the space to feel, et cetera. But it's in those brainstorming times with, with the other folks that we're designing for that typically like light bulbs will go off. And we will, we will see an opportunity to create a space that fulfills something that they have a desire to offer to their team.
[00:25:38] In most good design, it's a, it's a collaboration and there's, um, there's constant kind of like contributions from who, in this case, who are our clients in a traditional setting of real estate development, these would be our clients. And in this case, they're actually our peers or co workers. And so it's like getting to know them and understanding what it is that they want to offer and then like making that come to life for them. That is, uh, that's how, that's how we work.
[00:26:05] Claude Burns: And how do you know you like nailed an office or nailed a space?
[00:26:09] Matt Mohamed: Some of it really has to do with, a lot of it has to do with how people use the space after it's open. Um, if they're walking in and just going to their desk and putting their head down and never, like, interacting with any other part of the space, I don't think that we find that very successful.
[00:26:24] Um, if they, however, are, if you see people kind of like taking themselves and moving around the space and, um, interacting with other people and changing their work setting throughout the day, I think then we, we see that as much more successful and, um, kind of a nod toward creating an environment that is, um, dynamic and alive rather than just, uh, you know, creating a space for people to have a nine to five job, it really gives them something more than that.
[00:26:55] Claude Burns: That's great. Well, Matt, I really appreciate your time today and, uh, talking to us about, uh, a really kind of unique program and sort of way of approaching sort of in office experiences for employees and giving us a little bit behind the scenes on how you actually approach creating these, like, unique concepts and installations.
[00:27:12] Matt Mohamed: Claude, thanks so much. Happy to be here.
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[00:27:15] Claude Burns: Thank you for joining us today on Office Libations Unwrapped, for this interview with Matt Muhammad at Verkada. Don't forget to subscribe to our podcast for future episodes filled with inspiration, ideas, and strategies to optimize your workplace culture. And remember, happy employees make happy customers. Until next time, I'm your host, Claude Burns.