I took a position to help stand up an IT department for a local manufacturer. In the next year or two we'll be bringing on some more staff to help maintain day-to-day operations and it got me thinking: what do technicians and engineers want in a workspace these days?

I've WFH for the last 6 years as a software engineer but am coming from a large enterprise (also manufacturing) with a sea of tall cubes.

I've heard lots of pushback from 'open' office concepts and get the concern. But what do you find effective in a workspace?

Details:

* Space is separate from the rest of the facility (think 15' x 30' box)

* This space will probably be home to 2-3 people.

* Most of our systems will be cloud-hosted but we do have some on-prem equipment that is going to be in a closet within this space, if that's helpful.