Workplace Visibility and the Impacts on Informal Interaction Hossein Motamed Chaboki 1 Ahmad Fauzi A. Wahab 2 Faculty of built environment University Technology Malaysia Skudai, Malaysia mchossein2@live.utm.my 1 , b-fauzi@utm.my 2 Majid Ansari Faculty of management University Technology Malaysia Skudai, Malaysia amajid5@live.utm.my Abstract - The aim of this paper is to investigate a crucial element in workplace layout, visibility, and its impacts on “face to face” informal interaction in the workplace. It is believed that a certain space layout will provide the opportunity for employees to interact informally with each other thus increases the possibility of team working. The greater level of team working in any organization will lead to higher knowledge sharing and productivity. The methods to improve the possibility of unplanned communication and ease of informal interaction within a work area are classified under spatial interaction. This spatial interconnectedness contains workers’ visibility; worker`s movements and accessibility within the work space. In this study, employees answered the questions in the questionnaire to complete a self-report study that measured variables of the research in an office. They received an online questionnaire including measures for every of the key variables. Several of those dimensions are taken from an analysis created for a giant organization, and other parts are retained measures from the older physical workplace findings. SPSS statistic software is used for analyzing the data and layout plans by Depth map. The results indicate that the visibility of the worker`s spaces is significantly correlated to informal interaction. The study highlights the importance of visibility in the layout plan to creating suitable space for informal interaction that can be used as a measurement for productivity. Keyword: visibility, workplace layout, productivity and informal interaction i. Introduction In recent years, the ancient boundary activities connecting the companies to their environment are supplemented by a bunch of informal interactive ventures. Informal interaction has been described as the social glue of the workplace [1]. Most “face to face” interactions in the work area are informal, and include conversations and meetings. This type of communication is the basis of most of the professional relationships. Researchers outline Informal communications as taking place synchronously in face-to-face settings. They are different from other strategies of intervention communication like phone, documents, memos, email, FAX and voice mail For most workplace staff, informal communication is a frequent workplace activity, and for several jobs like management it represents the most frequent workplace activity. Older analysis indicated that between 25% and 70% of time being spent in informal FTF interaction. Informal interaction supports a variety of various functions: the execution of work-connected tasks; coordination of group activity; transmission of office culture; and social functions like a team making [2]. Previous research showed that between 25% till 70% of communication between employees are informal [3]. Communication in the organization can help Knowledge to flow from units that are fairly knowledge-rich to units that are reasonably knowledge-poor. Indeed, Informal interaction also can improve the quality of communication and helps to better knowledge sharing between employees [3][4]. Its significance is presented by research into scientific collaboration demonstrating that the physical atmosphere condition may be a strong predictor of whether or not scientists will co-publish, as a result of people who are physically collocated are a lot of probabilities to communicate frequently and informally. This paper contributes to the understanding and of informal interaction across organizations, and it tries to find new ways to develop the informal Built Environment Proceedings of 4th International Graduate Conference on Engineering, Science and Humanities IGCESH, 2013 ISSN: 1823-3287 936