Auditory distractions coming from workspace’s surroundings have been shown to negatively impact the performance of knowledge workers on complex tasks.  We theorize that an Adaptable Workspace (AW) can mitigate the negative impacts on performance. 

AW is a workspace that supports quick transformation of a workspace’s micro-environment into open, partially-open, and closed environment as required by a knowledge worker at a given time.  However, implementing AW can be costly and therefore a justification is needed for investments in AW.  We present a mathematical model to evaluate the value of AW over static workspaces for knowledge organizations.  The model variables are generated from an existing literature and further development of the model is proposed as a research study. 

The business objective of the model is to help decision makers make informed decisions about the adoption of a static workspace over an AW.  The intended clientele are facility decision makers, architects, and knowledge workers.