The Office Place.

• Position: Business Profile - Company Profile

After six years of keeping up with changes and innovations in the office industry, there's one thing the 160 employees of The Office Place have learned: There's no such thing as a static office. The methods and machines we use to conduct the daily grind are changing rapidly. What is state-of-the-art now will be standard features in the not-too-distant future.

"We've seen a general trend in companies to become more efficient. Nowhere is that more important than in the office place," says company president Bob Ballow. "There are less people doing more work. More than ever before, they need better tools to accomplish this. The hours in the day do not expand; their greater output ties directly into the efficiency of their work place."

Advanced Technology.

The office of the future is here today, according to Ballow. Today's office workers are surrounded by mega-memory computers and office machines that seemingly do the work for them.

"One of the latest buzzwords you hear in this industry is 'connectivity' -- the ability to network your computer, copier and fax together. This enables you to do everything without ever leaving your terminal," Ballow says. "The software to make this happen exists today and I'd say in two to three years, connectivity will be a commonplace phenomenon in the office industry."

Efficiency doesn't end with a high-powered computer terminal. Workers' comfort is also a major factor determining how smoothly an office runs. "Today, everyone is concerned with ergonomics," Ballow says. "Five years ago, you would never have heard of an ergonomic foot rest; now almost everything in an office is designed for the worker's productivity. We're helping companies to realize that making your workers comfortable allows them to do a better job."

Product Diversity.

For Walter John, vice president of the supplies division, keeping current with the latest innovations in the office industry is one of the most challenging and exciting elements of his job at The Office Place. "We have more than 8,000 different items on hand in our warehouse. That's more than any other office products dealer in Alaska," he says. "And we see our sales representatives as consultants to our customers. One of our goals is to train the marketplace on how to use what's available to...