In most company offices you can always tell which is the boss’s desk by the huge leather chair that sits behind it. The boss’s chair is designed to dominate and to make him or her appear larger than life, so we tend to associate large leather office chairs with rank and authority. But does this mean that leather office chairs are necessarily the right choice, either for the boss or for the company? Some experts would say that the leather chair image needs to go as rather than being a company asset it could actually be harming the sitter’s health and the company’s productivity and image.

Most leather office chairs are not necessarily the quality items we would expect them to be. With this type of chair, if you want quality then you should be prepared to pay for it. If the price on a leather chair looks to good to be true then it probably is – some chairs that are sold as leather have only a leather coating, scratch the surface and what you’ve really bought is a vinyl chair. To add insult to injury some leather office chairs are constructed from poor quality materials and give little or no support to the sitter. So the first thing to remember if you’ve really set your heart on a leather office chair is that it is going to cost you a hefty chunk of your office furniture budget.

If you do sit in a leather chair all day you should be aware that it is not good for your clothes. The seat of your pants can end up as shiny as the seat that you are sitting in. The other drawback with leather is that it is slippery and you can find yourself inadvertently sliding around all over the place. Not only is this uncomfortable, it is a positive nightmare if you are trying to work at a computer screen, which requires a certain amount of stability.

In most of today’s modern offices bosses are tired of sacrificing their comfort and productivity in the name of image and they are giving up the big leather chair in favor of a more ergonomically sound one made from mesh. Mesh chairs are the latest thing in ergonomic office furniture. The design not only supports your posture but mesh lets air flow round the body, keeping things at a much more even and comfortable temperature. Mesh chairs have all the advantages of other ergonomic chairs and many office managers are finding that getting rid of their imposing leather chair was good for them and good for the company.