Workplace case study

Unitus Community Credit Union

Untius Business Center | Design Build

the goals

Deliver Unitus Community Credit Union’s long-term strategies of Innovation, Inclusiveness, and Inspiring Service with a workplace building that supports employees where and how they work in a comfortable and welcoming environment.

Project Background

The pandemic was a catalyst for the Unitus Community Credit Union team to re-evaluate what they value and need in a corporate workplace environment. The credit union embarked on a hybrid workplace strategy supported by what they termed the Distributed Administrative Network, a regional collection of physical workplace locations for employees to work, collaborate, and connect.

The Unitus Business Center in Tigard, OR is the first phase of Untius’ Distributed Administrative Network strategy.

Celebrating Northwest Roots

Guests at the branch are immediately welcomed with a bright and welcoming atmosphere, with light from the branch’s tall clerestory windows illuminating the exposed cross-laminated timber framing and reclaimed wood paneling.

Concrete floors offset the wood tones and ground the space, while frosted trees on the interior windows both enhance the branch’s pacific northwest atmosphere and provide additional privacy in the hotel offices while preserving a feeling of openness. And despite the branch’s efficient use of 3,200 square feet, the lobby and hotel offices feel much larger due to high ceilings and windows.

The branch focuses around a teller line, which helps staff efficiently process transactions. Seating flanks each side of the counter, allowing members to have more in-depth conversations with staff. These conversations are also supported by additional hotel offices, where members can engage in conversations around more complex topics such as wealth management and home lending.

Inclusivity

Diversity, equity, and inclusion are important values for both Unitus Community Credit Union and Momentum, and together the teams worked to integrate inclusive design into the physical workplace environment.

One of the early steps in Momentum’s strategic process is to bring a diverse range of employee voices to the table through focus groups and discussion sessions. This bottom-up strategy ensures that the needs of employees are represented in the design process, and results in more supportive and inclusive workspaces than a top-down process where requirements are set exclusively by leadership.

One of the strongest examples of this is Activity Based Working, a design strategy based around supporting the various activities that employees engage in and giving them choices in working location throughout the day.

Rather than being reserved for prestigious offices, the prime corners of the Unitus Business Center are open collaboration spaces. A variety of wellness and lactation rooms support a diverse range of employee needs, from a dark color palette and dim lighting to help recover from a headache to a light and airy wellness room for a neurodiverse employee to get a break from overstimulation.

Restrooms are single-occupant and gender neutral, giving employees more privacy. And while the break room was designed as a central community space filled with social spaces, games, and activities that bring employees together, there are thoughtful and quiet zones for people who want peace and relaxation.

To learn more about DEI in workplace design, read the Filene Research Institute report “Bridging the Spatial Divide: A Guide to Achieving Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Physical Work Environments” (published in partnership with Momentum) at filene.org/556.

Innovation

A key requirement of the Unitus workplace is to ensure that hybrid work is fully supported and that people working from home not only feel included, but empowered to collaborate with their team members to drive innovation forward. This is fulfilled by video and meeting technology integration throughout the building, including mini video focus rooms for individuals or small groups to join in on video calls with their distributed coworkers. Every meeting and conference space is fully equipped with virtual collaboration technology, making it a seamless attribute of these rooms rather than an afterthought.

Designing the facility for virtual collaboration not only supports hybrid workers, but will also serve to connect employees across the Distributed Administrative Network as more locations open.

An Inspiring Community Space

The workplace environment also offers an inspiring and calming experience for employees, featuring high-quality lighting, abundant greenery, and décor that celebrates the Unitus brand and local Portland area community, featuring artists from the vibrant local arts scene.

Unitus Community Credit Union’s commitment to sustainability also shaped the design of the space, with design decisions factoring in environmental impact and sustainability as a high priority. As a demonstration of this commitment, Momentum and Unitus are pursuing LEED Certification for the project.

UBC-Tigard is located adjacent to five acres of on-site wetlands that Unitus Community Credit Union owns and has committed to conserving and protecting as part of their commitment to environmental sustainability. This natural area serves as a beautiful backdrop to the complimentary outdoor facilities that Momentum developed for the site, featuring a covered community space built of sustainably grown, laminated wood timbers and surrounded by native plants and a variety of active amenities including a pickleball court and lawn bowling.

Our credit union design build services on this project included:

Design Build, Brand and Culture Integration, Employee Growth and Space Needs Projections, Real Estate Procurement, Hybrid Work, Wellness, workplace strategy & hybrid work

Brand & Culture Integration

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Workplace Strategy & Hybrid Work

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Design-Build

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Real Estate Procurement

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Wellness &
Sustainability

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Momentum Moment

One of the biggest questions for Unitus Community Credit Union was “Where?”

Momentum developed a workplace strategy for Unitus that included internal research and focus groups to inform a property search checklist covering the criteria most important to the credit union team. Momentum performed a total investment analysis that showed a move from renting to ownership was better for long-term return on investment.

Momentum worked with a real estate broker to build a short-list of properties that met Unitus’ criteria on paper and toured them with the Unitus team to select the best fit. The Unitus team also wanted to understand how long it would take for their employees to their new workplace, leading Momentum to develop an application that calculates employee driving and transit commute times and generates a report with an interactive map.

With this information in hand, Unitus Community Credit Union was able to expedite the decision-making process and choose their best new location. The team relied on Momentum’s comprehensive due diligence management to guide the property acquisition and closing. Within a few months of setting out on a location search, the Unitus team was moving forward with renovations to their new, optimized workplace.

Property selection can be a daunting process for any project, but the Momentum team helps organizations cut through informational overload and focus in on what they need to know to choose the best location for their workplace.

services included:

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