Is it worth the commute?

By Brian Dryden

Landlords and property owners looking for a template to design the hybrid office of today will likely be sorely disappointed, experts in the field suggest.

“There is not a one-size-fits-all, there’s no real silver bullet, there’s no overall template,” argues Lisa Fulford-Roy, senior vice-president of client strategy with CBRE.

“Successful and thoughtful hybrid programs are based on what is fundamental to the business in order to achieve its goals,” she continues. “A hybrid office space needs to offer companies flexibility. The traditional office space of the past was often a lot of individual offices for managers, with desks for employees. A hybrid office needs to offer space to experiment with different configurations.”

The COVID pandemic, which required most employees to work from home, only accelerated changes in office design that were already underway, prompted and enabled by technology.

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“Technology is changing how and when people work. No longer are employees sitting at desks processing paper, but instead are moving around the workplace or offsite as they collaborate with colleagues and clients,” says Michele Fischer, a senior advisor in real estate with Deloitte.

“Most employees do not want to feel tethered to their desks for eight hours per day.”

Fischer agrees that there is no one-size-fitsall template for how to create a hybrid office, which combines remote work with an in-office presence. It all depends on business goals and the expectations of what such an office can do for the company and employees, she says.

“As long as they’re being effective, many employees realize they can work from home and do their jobs and they like the flexibility that that allows,” Fischer notes, adding that employees have to be enticed to return to the office now that the pandemic is not disrupting daily life. “It’s hard putting that genie back in the bottle.”

Her recommendation is that office space use an activity-based work (ABW) model and move away from a traditional office design with dedicated work areas.

“In an ABW environment, employees choose between a variety of different workspaces,” she explains. “Employees do not have a single dedicated workstation and can work in the kind of space that best supports the type of work they are going to be doing on any given day.

“Spaces are designed to create opportunities for a variety of activities, from focused work to impromptu collaboration or more formal meetings,” she adds.

Just as many companies have been examining the pros and cons of a hybrid office, landlords have to think about how to make their properties more attractive to rent in the new reality.

Fischer, who herself works in a hybrid office, says most businesses are considering moving to a hybrid office situation, if they haven’t made the change already. She suggests companies discuss the idea with employees and use a pilot project to determine what works best.

From July 2021 through November 2021, Deloitte conducted an online assessment that garnered responses from more than 8,000 business professionals from hundreds of organizations and asked their preferences for virtual versus in-person work.

Just over 10 per cent of respondents said they want to work almost exclusively virtually, and just under 10 per cent said almost exclusively in person. At the same time, 22 per cent said they would prefer a bit more in person time, 23 per cent preferred a bit more virtual time, and 35 per cent preferred half and half.

“Planning to make sweeping changes that will affect your organizational culture and performance for years to come could be a risk without a clear understanding if these changes are the right solutions for your organization. Piloting new spaces provides a low-risk and high-reward solution,” Fischer says.

One way to make the physical office attractive to employees, she says, is by emphasizing the social aspect and “celebrating the unplanned by fostering a sense of being together in a post-pandemic office.”

“During the lockdowns, we’ve said goodbye to casual connections or ‘collisions’ where we had impromptu conversations,” Fischer says.

“If we think about the physical space, it really has to deliver on a great experience in order to make it worth the commute, so you’re really competing with the comfort of home that has developed over the past couple of years and then also competing with whether or not it’s worth making the commute in and out of the office,” says Fulford-Roy.

“That doesn’t mean there’s necessarily pool tables everywhere and free food all day everyday, but thinking effectively about what the experience needs to be to connect back to the business priorities, objectives and culture of the organization.”

Fischer stresses the need to create spaces around what she calls “moments that matter” by using the 5Cs (collaboration, community, creativity, coaching and culture). There needs to be space for in-person collaboration and shared workspaces for “teaming,” she adds.

The goal is to provide an “environment rich with opportunities for interaction, connection and socialization,” she notes.

Fischer cautions that remote work reduces opportunities for spontaneous creativity. Equally, she says, engaged employees need strong connections and development opportunities with managers and other team members.

“The 5Cs are meant to represent the common motivations for employees to come to the office – not necessarily to work solo on a spreadsheet or spend the day on calls.

“What spaces do companies need to enable the 5Cs in the physical workplace? In blanket terms, the answer is often more open space, conference space, whiteboard, collaboration and interaction space,” Fischer says.

How the intersection of the physical and digital worlds will impact the workplace

The headquarters location likely will be less dense, with a greater emphasis on shared collaboration space rather than dedicated individual space. Activity-based workplaces will become even more in vogue. Higher-quality build-outs with the finishes, furnishings, technology and amenities that draw employees into the workplace will be more commonplace. Desk-sharing will be integral to satisfy a more mobile workforce that uses the office on a part-time basis, while promoting cost efficiency.

Conference rooms will be designed to create productive environments for in-person and remote workers to engage productively and on a level playing field. There will be techenabled rooms of all sizes with intuitive tools that allow participants to seamlessly connect and collaborate virtually and effectively. Telephone-only conferencing will no longer suffice. Providing meeting participants with the virtual technology to both see and hear each other whether in or out of the office is the way forward.

Mobile apps to connect employees with one another and to navigate the physical environment will become paramount for effective communication and company culture. These include building layouts and access, space booking, food delivery and adjacent amenities. In short, it will be necessary to offer employees the same things they have in the palm of their hands in their personal lives.

Portfolio strategies could become less centralized, providing more locations to satisfy the needs of a more mobile workforce. Creating a network of locations that are easy to access and evoke a feeling of belonging and familiarity for transient guests will be integral to future portfolio strategy. A premium value likely will be placed on flexible space options as a portion of this strategy. Pay-as-you-go “desk pass” systems may be more commonplace in the future. Source: CBRE US