Office world

Is the office landscape about to change forever?

With remote working becoming the norm for many businesses since the virus outbreak and the economic downturn creating a need to reduce overheads, many companies are looking to contain office costs.

While these factors would suggest a bleak future for offices, they overlook some of the key benefits of a shared workplace. In many cases, a company’s culture is grounded in its office environment, which is important for employees, new recruits and clients alike. As a result, physical workspaces in the future will need to evolve to strike a balance between the traditional and virtual office.

What does this mean for our cities?
Cities around the world are the focal point for office culture. Excellent transport connections, an abundance of meeting places and a lively atmosphere have always been a draw, and this is unlikely to change in the future. However, the way in which we interact with these spaces is likely to evolve as offices become increasingly flexible.

Research from Cardiff and Southampton universities indicate that 9 in 10 workers who have worked from home during the pandemic would like to continue in some form. Office spaces are likely to reflect this in the future, with `zoom rooms' to enable virtual conferencing from the office and agile workspaces where workers can come together to collaborate away from assigned desks.

As a result, the volume of space is likely to be reduced or repurposed in many city centre locations. Looking at global examples of evolving workspaces, Eversheds Sutherlands law practice in Hong Kong has evolved to be a modular ‘hotel-like design’, where the focus is on agile communal areas and private rooms for calls, with flexibility to evolve the space with the needs of the company.

In the US, surplus office space is being considered to address housing shortages, something that Boris Johnson has also alluded to with his promise to ‘Build, build, build’ alongside changes to zoning and planning procedures. This type of development in cities can create hybrid working and living spaces which will help to retain a local market for businesses in city centres.

What does this mean for our suburbs?
Looking at global trends, Singapore had already begun to invest in steps to decentralise the central business district before the pandemic. The Urban Redevelopment Authority were looking to create satellite business centres around the city to avoid over-crowding in the city centre. While Covid is likely to expedite this plan in Singapore, this may be an approach that we begin to see in other global cities.

If this decentralisation of office space happens in the UK's cities, the requirement for office space in suburban locations is likely to increase. Given existing transport connections, could high streets provide the space for this? Typically, flexible workspace propositions such as WeWork (seen above) have been reluctant to open in these locations due to lack of footfall and market opportunity, but if these spaces become the focal point of the town, there may be an opportunity for these operators to become drivers for change.

Will companies innovate or relocate?
Office spaces are inevitably going to evolve as company operations across the world have shifted to survive the pandemic. In cities, this provides opportunities for innovative mixed-use concepts, while in the suburbs it may be the stimulus to draw footfall back to the UK's towns. Importantly, businesses need to ensure that future solutions bring together the best elements of office working, while enabling employees the flexibility to retain some of the positives from their time as remote workers.

Natasha Hewitt