Vooruit is a vibrant arts center in Ghent, Belgium. They offer a year-round calendar packed with artistic, musical, literary and social events to more than 300,000 visitors annually.
Founded in 1982, the center grew organically from a group of friends into an organisation of more than eighty full-time and temporary collaborators working in the iconic Vooruit building, a century-old protected monument in the heart of the city.
Breaking down physical and virtual departmental walls
As the program and visitor base continues to expand, artistic programmers, planners, marketeers, stage engineers and hospitality staff are under constant pressure to share more information and collaborate more closely. Consequently, Vooruit decided to break through the physical and digital departmental walls and redesign its workspace.
Scattered department offices were replaced with a three-level activity-based loft space where team members can freely relocate as their work requires. The open work area is built with sustainable and locally sourced materials integrating a green wall, a rooftop garden and natural light to conserve energy and water.
Co-creating the digital workplace
Vooruit worked with Peel to design an equally sustainable digital workspace. Observing Vooruit team members across the organisation, Peel suggested roles, processes and tools to complement strong collaboration patterns and patch weak spots. Through workshops and quick prototypes, we identified solutions that take into account the diversity of user types, and the 24/7 and highly mobile nature of the work of organising events. This approach allowed us to come up quickly with digital services that responded to actual needs. In the process, we limited the impact of an already considerable change process for the Vooruit, and saved the organisation a lot of money typical of a wholesale digitalisation of information management and collaboration.
Peel then teamed up with a technical partner to roll out the digital services and coach user adoption. Vooruit now continuously tracks user feedback to improve and build on the first release of the services.
The power of a workplace bar
We had a great time working with the enthusiastic team at Vooruit, and we can highly recommend both the Café and the sunny rooftop bar, where some of the best ideas came up as we discussed them over a beer on Friday nights.
