How it works
Blocking and stacking are two steps of the same process. The stack plan decides which floor each team goes on. The block plan then works on one floor at a time, dividing it into areas and giving each team a block sized to its needs, with shared spaces such as meeting rooms, focus rooms and amenities placed around them.
Each block is sized from the team's seat requirement, usually peak-day attendance plus a buffer for hybrid teams, and placed by adjacency: teams that work together sit next to each other, and teams that need quiet sit away from busy circulation and social areas. Fixed elements such as cores, windows, columns and existing rooms shape where blocks can go.
An approved block plan sets the boundaries for neighborhoods and seat-level plans. Desks are assigned or made bookable inside each block, so a later change in one team can often be absorbed within its block without redrawing the floor.
How to measure it
- Compare each block's seats with the team's peak-day attendance; a large gap means the block is oversized.
- Check that each block is near the room types its team uses most, such as small meeting rooms or focus booths.
- Record which adjacency requests the plan meets and which it does not, so trade-offs are visible.
Examples
- On a floor of 180 desks, the block plan gives Engineering the quiet east wing, Sales the area near the elevators and Product a block between them, with shared meeting rooms at the boundaries.
- A team that grows by a few people expands into an adjoining flexible block instead of triggering a new stack plan.
Common mistakes
- Drawing blocks from headcount rather than attendance, which gives hybrid teams far more floor than they use.
- Skipping the stack step and blocking floors one at a time, which can leave related teams on different floors.
- Filling every square foot, which leaves no flexible block for growth or for teams in transition.
How Kadence helps
Kadence SpaceOps takes a stack plan down to seat-level layouts on real floor plans, and floor plans can be imported and edited in the browser. In WorkOps, team neighborhoods turn each block into a zone on the interactive floor plan, where people book or are assigned desks, and the Neighborhood Scheduler assigns teams to neighborhoods by date on floors that rotate.
SpaceOps · Space management · Office space planning guide
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between a block plan and a stack plan?
A stack plan works vertically across a building and decides which floor each team occupies. A block plan works within one floor and decides which area of that floor each team gets. Stacking comes first; blocking follows.
What does blocking and stacking mean?
Blocking and stacking is the two-step space planning process of assigning teams to floors (stacking) and then to zones on each floor (blocking). It is used for new offices, relocations and restacks, and it produces the brief for the detailed seat-level layout.
When do you need a block plan?
Whenever a floor will hold more than one team, and especially when moving into new space, restacking a building or setting up neighborhoods for hybrid teams. The block plan settles which team sits where on the floor before anyone discusses individual desks.
Who creates a block plan?
Usually the in-house space planner or workplace team, sometimes with an architect or interior designer for a new fit-out. Team leaders supply their requirements and adjacency needs, and real estate or finance approves the result when it affects cost.
Related terms
- Stack planning A floor-by-floor plan of which teams occupy which floors and buildings, used to test moves and consolidations first.
- Team adjacency Placing teams that work closely together near each other, and keeping those links intact through every move.
- Space planning Deciding how office floor area is divided and allocated, from which teams go on which floors to where each desk and room sits.
- Floor plate The area and shape of one floor of a building, which sets how many people, rooms and teams fit on it.
- Test fit A quick draft layout that checks whether a space program fits a specific building before a lease is signed.
- Plan of record The approved, current version of a stack, block or move plan that every team works from.
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