Storm warning for offices

Expert

It would be unfortunate to be able to predict the future of the office today. However, on closer inspection, the health crisis has only exacerbated major trends that already existed. Prior to the crisis, many studies pointed to workstations being occupied about 50% of the time (due to meetings, training, travel or even vacations). The "problem" of the half-empty office was already a reality.

The solution must be plural and specific to each organization according to its nationality, its sector of activity, its geography or its corporate culture. Today, the rules of distancing allow at least 80% of workstations to be used. Conversely, some companies have switched to 100% teleworking. Let's beware of applying so-called miracle answers, the all open space, then the all flex office, then the all telework. The motivation to move to telework cannot be only the wallet, at the risk of leading to the opposite result with major induced costs (malaise, turnover, etc.). As in cooking, it's all a matter of dosage, culture and adaptation. The ingredients available: reorganize work spaces to create more collaborative spaces at the expense of individual workstations (ratios of 30/70 to 50/50 or even 70/30); reduce surface areas where necessary, or even take on different ones elsewhere, instead or in addition. Here again, all of this requires enlightened support to avoid succumbing to the easy way out or to the prejudicial fashion effect.

As for the half-empty offices, the question is whether they will remain so for long. The health crisis has been followed by an economic crisis, and the government is working to reduce its impact. Companies must certainly become more agile and adapt their real estate operating tool to new constraints. But reconciling the long timeframe of real estate with the short timeframe of operations remains complex. An essential prerequisite is to build a constructive dialogue with the lessor to reconcile flexibility and sustainability.

In the end, the big question for each organization is to know what happens in its offices. Why do people come to the office? And why don't they want to come anymore? For example, employees in the Paris region have had a better experience of confinement and telecommuting than employees in the regions*. Behind this trend, one may wonder if the experience of forced telework has not revealed pain points that were not sufficiently expressed in companies until now, such as transportation times in urban areas. Telework has undermined the collective dynamics and culture of the company. So yes, employees will certainly go to the office less often. Yes, office use will be different and will certainly influence companies' real estate strategies. Yes, offices in the future will most certainly be smaller. But they will also and surely be better thought out and better placed. They will reinforce the collective and social dimension while not neglecting individual situations. And let's not forget that telework is not just about home. Between the traditional office and the home, thanks to technology, the range of use of third places is wide.

We spend most of our waking life in our workplaces, so this is a very important issue. This is a real company project that must be based on co-construction and involve all levels of the organization (management, middle management, teams), and all functions (finance, IT, human resources), so that the transformation is desired and not undergone ... as is too often the case!

* Kardham survey "The impact of the health crisis on the work environment", 3,049 respondents, October 2020

** Les Echos: https://www.lesechos.fr/thema/mipim-2020/marche-des-bureaux-les-six-questions-a-se-poser-1242850

Release date: November 2020