Rethinking Office in the Hybrid Era
Plus a sneak peek at our upcoming Tech Deep Dive!
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Beyond Square Footage: Rethinking Commercial Real Estate in the Hybrid Era | Dave Cairns
In this episode of Flex Perspectives, Rob Sadow is joined by Dave Cairns, a Future of Work strategist at Kadence and former SVP at CBRE Canada.
Join us as we discuss:
How Dave's experience as a professional poker player shaped his perspective on the future of work
The changing dynamics of real estate brokerage and office space productivity evaluation
Where we're headed with work location flexibility
Also available on Apple Podcasts.
Coming Soon: Tech Deep Dive Flex Report
The Tech industry was an early adopter of Fully Flexible work in the pandemic, with a large percentage of firms committing to Fully Remote work or optional office attendance. But a lot has changed over the last couple of years.
Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, and Meta have all committed to Structured Hybrid models, requiring employees in the office roughly three days a week. On the other hand, NVIDIA — arguably the hottest company in the world — has continued to embrace an Employee’s Choice approach to the office.
So what’s happening in the Tech industry broadly? Are we seeing a continued willingness to embrace remote work, or is Tech steadily shifting back toward more office-centric cultures? In this report we’ll explore the evolution in Tech policies from our first Tech deep dive (May 2023) to the present, with a particular lens toward the variation in policy by company size.
FlexGPT Stat of the Week
The number one motivator for employees to come into the office is interacting with colleagues. Yet, most hybrid companies are not embracing specific days per week requirements for their hybrid work models.
This analysis is inspired by Erica Keswin, Human Workplace Expert and WSJ Best Selling Author. Her FlexGPT query finds that:
88% of hybrid firms are either Min Days / Week or Employee’s Choice
Only 8% of hybrid firms have a Specific Days element to their hybrid work policy
This creates a pretty fundamental challenge for hybrid organizations. How do you balance flexibility needs with ensuring the purpose of the office is fulfilled? Investing in team-level agreements and coordination becomes paramount to close the gap.
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Company Spotlight
“We have Employee’s Choice offices in the USA and Brazil, with the UK winding up our HQ in London. Some of our country offices operate under different rules — with more or less flexibility, depending on local leadership. We are working hard to equalize the experience of the workplace in all our offices so we can offer the same great flexibility to all our colleagues worldwide.”
In the Media
Forbes: A recent survey from ResumeBuilder found that 8 in 10 employers lost talent to return-to-office mandates.
AllWork: Remote work is a staple of today’s U.S. job market, but data shows the greatest factor in deciding who lands these positions could be a college degree.
Time: For many white-collar workers, the days are gone when they had clearly delineated five-day workweeks in the office interrupted by “summer Fridays” and a few weeks of vacation in July or August.
One Last Thing…
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Office Benchmarks offers powerful insights into your office footprint, space design, and usage compared to peers with similar policies. Maximize your workplace potential and make confident, informed investments.