The Global COVID-19 Pandemic is expected to act as a catalyst for transformational change upending business models everywhere. Whilst limited supply and predictable demand have helped protect the Property Industry from widespread disruption, a fundamental reorientation of the value chain may be on the horizon as the Industry reforms around the ultimate customers of commercial space, i.e. Corporate Occupiers (who are challenged with demands to support increasingly fluid business models whilst also improving operational efficiency) and their employees (who after working by themselves during the pandemic are now pondering whether their alternative workplace destination is worth the journey).

This series of thought leadership article explores some of the challenges and opportunities which are likely to arise as Corporate Occupiers prepare for what the World Economic Forum has defined as ‘The Great Reset’ ahead (move to an all-digital, work-from-anywhere world).

Quote

“Computers will make it possible to live anywhere we like, any businessman or executive could live almost anywhere on earth and still do their business through a device like this, and this is a wonderful thing, it means we won’t be stuck in cities, we will be able to live out in the country or wherever we please, and still carry on interacting with other people as well as with other computers”. - Arthur C. Clarke

Renowned science fiction writer and futurist Arthur C. Clarke made plenty of predictions about life in the future, including the notion of desktop and home computing.

In this wonderful clip from 1974 (recently remastered in colour) we can see and hear one of the world’s greatest science fiction writers explain how in a future age, computers will enrich our lives  (Arthur C Clarke).

What I find so fascinating about this clip is not only did Arthur C. Clarke make the bold claim that we would one day talk to a compact form of the mainframe computer but he also correctly predicted that we would one day work from home and online!!

Reimagining the role of the corporate footprint

When we compare the evolutionary progress of the mainframe computer since the 1970’s and our physical workspace environments, it is clear that a substantial opportunity exists to challenge and reimagine how a corporate footprint can help an organisation thrive in an era of exponential technologies and virtualisation.

Since the start of the 21st century, digitalisation and customer centricity have become the cornerstones underpinning almost every organisational model. Although the immediate outlook remains very challenging, a future reorientation of the Property Industry around the customer could help to magnify the opportunities for value creation in an exponential age.

Whether or not such a customer revolution takes hold will in large part rest with corporate occupiers themselves, who are charged with the task of reimagining future performance metrics and co-creating solutions to solve the creative collaboration conundrum (why were homes designed for living more effective workplaces than offices?).

The virtualisation of the workplace over the last 12 months has ignited innovative thinking and entrepreneurial activity across the Industry and given corporate occupiers everywhere first-hand experience of managing a digital-first organisation.

The paradigm shift in corporate occupier demands which has ensued, highlights the importance of developing an obsessive focus on the real ‘customer’ and may, over the long-term, mark the beginning of a wholesale customer centric re-orientation of the Industry.

Whilst the pandemic exposed the accelerated pace of change ahead, which is symbolic of the ‘fourth industrial revolution’, it has also opened our eyes to some of the more complex challenges faced by corporate occupiers, who are tasked with reassessing future demand requirements and reimagining the role of the corporate footprint.

The long duration of compulsory working from home has significantly altered employee expectations and working norms, lessening the appeal of traditional one-size fits all workplaces whilst also heightening importance of culture, collaboration and togetherness. 

What remains unknown, is whether reduced days spent in the office coupled with a pivot in focus from people to skills, raises the prospect of a more rapid move to a shared economy and a ‘talent in the cloud’ organisational model.

As we move into a decade of virtualisation, the future of work will likely remain one of the most widely discussed and challenged topics.  Whilst the necessity to maintain a distributed workforce will continue as the pandemic gives way to an epidemic, given the long road to recovery, many organisations have already taken to the airwaves to announce digital-first or permanent work from anywhere flexibility.  

These announcements highlight a valuable opportunity to showcase adoption of a distributed workforce as an employee benefit and a key differentiator of the organisation.  Increased workplace agility will likely go hand in hand with increased agility over working hours.  What remains to be seen is whether the wide-spread embrace of geographically dispersed project teams leads to the embrace of ‘agile projects’, ‘agile support service teams’ and an acceleration in the adoption of digital first service models.

Whilst the end of ‘presenteeism’ is a welcome causality of the pandemic, co-location can enhance productivity and provide a real return on investment (albeit hard to measure ‘intangibles’) by cultivating an inclusive corporate culture, growing social capital and promoting employee wellness. 

However, few organisations today have policies or processes to effectively monitor or improve the mental health and wellbeing of employees in the workplace. Human-centric design (the philosophy of addressing individual need by truly understand the employee’s problem, before designing a solution to serve them) and human-centric workplaces (increased focus on human senses, employee wellness and workplace flexibility) are expected to gain prominence as corporate occupiers search for ideas to help accentuate the benefits of co-location, resulting in greater investment in community spaces which promote social interaction, collaboration and innovation.

Whilst the distributed working blueprint revealed by the pandemic lockdown has dramatically lessened the need to maintain physical workspaces spaces, it has also highlighted a need to increase focus on the interplay between workplace psychology, workplace design and workforce effectiveness. 

Identifying and supporting meaningful physical interactions in a healthy environment is now the primary responsibility and focus of corporate occupiers everywhere.  In addition to challenging and reimaging tomorrow’s corporate footprint, corporate occupiers must now also reimagine new operational performance metrics to support future organisational performance goals and fast changing employee expectations.

Although many are forecasting our current decade to be the most exciting in human history (due to the advent of exponential technologies), the accelerated pace of virtualisation will undoubtedly hinder long-term corporate planning for many organisations and encourage more corporate occupiers to recognise the value of scalable, on-demand office space solutions.

In such a fast-changing environment, the ability to positively reimage new customer centric performance measures and realign supply chains to support new ways of working, may in part be determined by the pace at which the Property Industry is able to reorientate around the demands and unmet challenges of the corporate occupier. 

Whilst many articles echo the advent of work from anywhere or adoption of hub and spoke models for all (downsizing and integrating central hub with an atomised regional offices located nearer employee homes), the reality may be an opportunity for increased corporate differentiation reflective of budgetary constraints and an organisation’s ability to frame the importance of purpose, culture and employee experience. 

One immediate benefit of our pandemic experience and exponential digitalisation of workplaces will be the opportunity for corporate occupiers to promote opportunities to reinvest future real estate savings in tomorrow’s proptech solutions.

Many post-pandemic challenges lie ahead, including how to monitor employee wellness, how to curate future office attendance and how to support a return of employees as the pandemic morphs into an epidemic.  Corporate Occupiers who become early adopter of future digital tools and proptech solutions will benefit from the advent of connected workplaces and their ‘digital exhaust’ (workplace data and information left behind from user interactions).  These meaningful insights will likely fuel tomorrow’s workplace models as well as new performance metrics.    

Corporate occupiers who foster a culture of innovation and experimentation will be better equipped to ride the waves of digital transformation ahead as exponential technologies continue to define our decade, punctuate our equilibrium and virtualise our world.

What do you think ?

Does emotional proximity now trump physical proximity ?

‘Reimagination opportunities in an disruptive world' will form the basis of my next article.

Blueprint for a Connected Occupier in a Collaborative World

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