FAIRFIELD — Cambridge Investment Research, Inc. in Fairfield undertook a major renovation of its offices in 2022.

Some of the most notable changes were a new open space design, the addition of sitting or standing workstations, desk sharing areas for commuters, and spaces for collaborative meetings. Jeff Vivacqua, Cambridge’s President of Growth and Development, said the changes made the offices safer in response to COVID and the need for social distancing, but they actually began before the pandemic.

In 2020, Cambridge opened a satellite office in Phoenix, Arizona, occupying about 10,000 square feet, which is much smaller than the space it occupies at its campus just north of Fairfield.

“We were looking for an additional talent pool, and wanted it in a place where it doesn’t snow, so people can still get to work,” Vivacqua said, explaining the decision to open an office in Arizona. “We decided to go with a more open floor plan and get more natural light with windows.”

The Arizona office was designed to give workers bigger work stations with ergonomic chairs.

“And since we were now going to be in multiple cities, we needed the technology to create teams in the two cities,” Vivacqua said. “We created more Huddle rooms for team meetings to do more than just telephone calls.”

Vivacqua said the leadership team at Cambridge spent 2021 making plans to incorporate that great design at the Arizona branch into the home base in Iowa. Cambridge was renting space down the road, but the team realized that that space wasn’t conducive to the company’s floor design, and that it wasn’t laid out how they wanted the staff to work.

“We looked at our floor plans, which is five floors between two buildings,” Vivacqua said. “We saw we could pick up 140 work stations by using our space more effectively with those same stand-up work desks, updated chairs and everything else that came with the Phoenix design. That included the Huddle Rooms, headsets and dual monitors.”

Vivacqua said the company prefers meetings through video calling, because you can have a better connection with a person when you can see their face.

“You see people as if you were all in the same room,” he said. “A financial services firm like Cambridge doesn’t need to be in New York or Chicago. We have 4,000 advisers working across the country, but we also don’t want our employees to feel like silos by themselves. There are times for collaboration.”

Vivacqua said that, in a Huddle Room, participants all have access to a shared screen whiteboard, where everyone can see the ideas that are being discussed on the whiteboard. The result is that advisers can feel more like a team and accomplish more even though they’re a thousand miles apart.

Cambridge employees have appreciated these changes, Vivacqua said. They liked having desks that go up and down depending on whether they want to stand while working, and the new chairs, headsets and dual monitors show that the company is investing in its employees.

“We have a culture of taking care of our associates,” Vivacqua said. “Happy employees lead to happy clients. That’s why we keep being recognized as a Top Workplace by the Des Moines Register, and nationally as a Top U.S. Workplace.”

As far as the changes that he sees on the horizon, Vivacqua said he expects Cambridge to continue growing. The company was not affected as much during the pandemic as businesses in other sectors were. Cambridge plans to expand its Arizona office even further, adding 10,000 square feet and 52 associates to its staff of 56 associates there.

Cambridge’s investment in expanding its offices, renovating its Fairfield offices, and serving its clients across the country has not gone unnoticed. In April 2023, Cambridge received the Business Improvement Award from the Fairfield Area Chamber of Commerce.