In Lyon, 170 sqm delivered in 2025 for Decideom, a Data & AI consulting firm partnered with eight software publishers (Qlik-Talend, PowerBI, Snowflake, Fivetran, Semarchy, Blueway, Data Galaxy). The brief fit in a single sentence: transform a standard office into an infrastructure able to absorb growth without restarting works. The Lyon area faces strong pressure on data engineer and BI architect profiles, with recruitment times exceeding four months for senior roles. The premises carried three handicaps: opaque partitioning that confiscated natural light, accessibility for people with reduced mobility patched up through successive waivers, and cabling undersized for large-volume processing. Decideom wanted to make these 170 sqm a recruitment argument and a production tool, within a tight budget.

170 sqm to repurpose under budgetary constraint and native accessibility

Three tensions structured the diagnosis. Accessibility first, historically handled through waivers when articles R4214-26 and following of the French Labour Code require an integrated approach from the very layout: this item, the most demanding of the project, conditioned the placement of circulation routes. The budget next, calibrated to the bare minimum, which ruled out technical overbidding and imposed centimetric trade-offs on every typology. Finally the density of uses: eight publisher ecosystems handled daily, coding, analysis, client training, steering committees, on a surface below the office median observed since 2006. Decideom’s management ruled out the blanket flex office reflex, poorly suited to senior data professions where the assigned workstation and partitioned concentration remain a documented retention factor.

Two structuring decisions: a measured dose of demountable partitions and native accessibility

Rather than a fixed floor plate, two decisions organised the project. First decision: calibrate the mix of drywall / demountable partitions to absorb four reconfigurations over five years without new works. The ratio was set on Decideom’s headcount trajectory, isolating concentration zones in drywall (Rw >= 42 dB, NF S 31-080:2006) and using demountable partitions for project rooms reconfigurable at the pace of the sprints. Second decision: integrate accessibility for people with reduced mobility into the initial layout of circulation routes, not as a corrective measure, which set passage widths before the typologies were carved out. With these two trade-offs settled, the rest was organised into four typologies: partitioned concentration zones, project rooms with movable partitions, a client training space modular up to twelve seats, and an informal zone treated with acoustic absorption. Seven work packages were coordinated in parallel: partitioning, movable partitions, redundant IT cabling (minimum four RJ45 sockets per workstation, pathways integrated into the false ceiling with ventilation and lighting), variable-temperature LED lighting calibrated to work rhythms, paint, flooring, furniture. Change management, run during the works, enabled the teams to take up their new positions from delivery, with no adjustment phase.

Four operational typologies, a scalable floor plate with no additional works

The bet on a modular rather than fixed floor plate rests on the project’s four axes. Functional: the four typologies absorb daily uses and the projected growth trajectory with no additional works planned over the lease term, which was the project’s economic condition. Recruitment: the visual signature aligned with the eight publisher ecosystems feeds directly into the qualification processes for senior profiles in a Lyon area where lead times exceed four months. Wellbeing: the pairing of 42 dB acoustics and variable-temperature LED lighting meets the prolonged concentration requirements of coding and analysis. Durability: the drywall / demountable mix preserves reconfiguration capacity over the lease term, and native accessibility for people with reduced mobility protects the employer in the event of hiring an employee with a disability or a labour inspection check. Reversing the blanket flex office approach turned the budgetary constraint into a senior retention argument.