Translation of an article that appeared in Finance, Slovenia’s daily financial newspaper, on Monday 18th May 2015

By, Jacqueline Stuart – Director of Slovenia Invest

We live in a fast changing world and connectivity has completely changed the working environment for most Companies. Globalization has had a big impact on workspaces worldwide. Corporate real estate teams now make decisions about office space centrally in most international companies, affecting millions of people in every part of the world.

Businesses around the globe are adapting and changing, and these changes are increasingly seen in the built environment.

Some of the current trends are an improvement on old ways of working, others are unlikely to last.

This is our prediction of which trends will fall by the wayside:

1)    Nerd playgrounds

Google is famous for its office space – gorgeous huge spaces with loads of perks, including slides. Business Insider compares 8 Google office spaces worldwide with different slides including the Google YouTube space with the Granddaddy of all slides, a carnival-level, open, three-lane slide with multiple waves.

I don’t intend to insult the intelligence of Finance readers by pointing out the reasons that slides belong in the playground, not the office.

2)    Predominant home working

Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer recently shocked the corporate community by ordering all home workers back to the office. The commentary at the time was that she was anti-home working, but that was not what it was about at all. It was really about recognizing that Yahoo employees were disconnected from the organization and cohesion was being impacted. She needed the business to regroup back in the office.

Neil McLocklin, head of Global business consulting EMEA for Cushman and Wakefield comments from London, ‘some of our Clients are seeing occupancy levels as low as 20%. The spiral of working from home a couple of days, then coming to the office to find nobody there to connect with as people are working from home, leads to working from home 3 days per week. This Vicious cycle needs to be reversed to create a Virtuous Cycle: employee comes to the office and meets people, collaborates, learns, develops, enjoys and performs to such an extent that they have achieved a significant return from investing in the commute’.

Human capital and talent is the number one issue on the minds of CEOs of the top 500 businesses globally. Big salaries and fat bonuses attract and motivate talent. But now there is a significant school of thought that there are better ways to do it. Daniel Pink, HR guru, advocates a new approach of autonomy, mastery and sense of purpose as primary motivators. Providing employees with the flexibility and freedom to work where and how they want, within and beyond the office, is a major step towards meeting the requirements of autonomy.

Clearly home working will not disappear, but Companies like Yahoo and others have learned it is not possible to have a joined up Company without collaboration in the office at least some of the time.

3)    2-dimensional efficiency drivers

The global financial crisis drove cost cutting in most areas of business, and real estate was no exception. When we get a brief from a global company now for new office space, they typically want an open plan space, with 10 unassigned workstations for every 13 employees, on the basis that there are always some people out of the office. We believe that time will show that this one size fits all approach does not work. A global investment bank recently appointed consultants to assist with aftercare issues, following a worldwide occupancy target of 120% that went wrong because of poor engagement with the people in the Company. A formulaic approach to workspace does not always work. Neil McLoklin describes Cushman and Wakefield’s approach to workspace requirements as activity based; the consultancy looks at the activity in the Client’s business and designs the workspace around it, rather than a target m2 per workstation.

Whilst they are yet to enter the workforce, very soon the effects of the ‘Millenials’ (those born in the year 2000 and beyond) will have an impact on the way we work. They have grown up consumed by technology – the Internet and mobile devices are completely integrated in their recreational time and in the classroom. At the other end of the scale, baby boomers are still present in the workplace and will be for some years to come as the number of 65+ workers increases. The built environment will also have to accommodate Generations X and Y.

Apart from the cultural differences of diverse age groups, employers should also consider individual personality types. Employees all have different psychological needs and responses. Entire departments within organizations often have predominance for a particular profile, such as a mainly introverted Research department or a mainly extroverted Sales department. Communication and collaboration between the two personality types can be hard to achieve due to differences in approach, priorities and perspective. But it is often strategically critical that diverse departments work closely together. Apple provides a great example of how two personality types collaborate successfully – the late Steve Jobs (the extrovert and face of Apple) and Steve Wozniak (the introvert and brains behind Apple products) created a phenomenally successful organization that would not be what it is today without the combined efforts of both individuals and their teams.

The office environment is one of the main catalysts for collaboration amongst employees but in most cases it does not support each personality type and provide shared environments in which they can work collaboratively.

Corporate real estate departments will have to ditch the 2-dimensional efficiency drivers and adopt an activity-based model for office planning.

4)    Single room fit out

Mars was the Company that pioneered open work environments. They got rid of private office spaces back in 1943. Today no one in the Company, not a single CEO, has a separate office. They believe this creates accessible environments, approachable people and honest communication. Forrest Mars famously kicked down a door when he visited a Mars office and discovered the open plan mantra was not being adhered to.

The new Facebook HQ is being designed as a ‘Single room’, one space that is 40,000m2 in size and will house 3,800 people. It will have the largest office floor plate in the world, equivalent to around 10 football pitches. There will be no enclosed offices or cubes, and employees will be able to travel around on skateboards.

Although single room fit outs work for some Companies, it is not the best solution for all. There are issues such as noise, privacy and confidentiality to be considered.

5)    Dictatorial corporate real estate teams

There is a tendency for some global corporate real estate teams to adopt a formulaic approach to office space and dictate standards and requirements to country offices without taking cultural sensitivities into account. There is often an issue with paid parking spaces in Ljubljana, most global companies will provide them for only a few very senior employees. Unfortunately public transport in cities like Ljubljana is poor and car ownership is high, so this creates a disconnect between local requirements and what the global employer is prepared to provide. Small kitchens are important in Slovenia as many office workers snack during the day before having lunch at home with their families after returning from work. Not all Companies want to provide such facilities.

We hope that global property teams will become more sensitive to local requirements in time and provide a flexible model that can be adapted to country needs.

6)    Token sustainability gestures

Some Companies insist on measures such as recycling regimes, even if all the trash then gets thrown in the same dustbin when it leaves the building. ‘Greenwash’ is easily recognized by employees, who are demanding more sophisticated approaches to sustainability.  A better approach will have to be adopted to ensure the future of the planet.

7)    Unisex toilets

No need for comments here, just happy this was never adopted in our office building.

Jacqueline Stuart is Director of Slovenia Invest