The Future of the Workplace

Having made a mid-career transition from design to strategy, this pandemic has personally also been a unique experience for me. I moved back to Asia and focused on building Savills APAC Workplace Consulting team, where Workplace Strategy and the translation of those strategies into a Concept Design that can be taken forward and realised by our clients.

What I have gleaned from the client conversations and surveys since February 2020 through to now – paints a varying picture across the APAC region. The differences are directly related to how that specific geography/country has been affected by this terrible world event.

Sentiments have changed dramatically throughout the past 18 months, and we can now see a more aligned perspective converging on a consensus that the future workplace will be one based on flexibility and choice, as the only constant we see going forward is change.

What we noticed was actually less of a change in the future workplace per say, but actually a change in work itself. For the last 100 years, an office has been an office, the fundamental DNA never really changed. Yes, the advances in modern technology and alike enabled the various internal mobility models, ABW, Agile, and alike, and that enables a greater array of design aesthetics. We also cannot ignore the rise of shared office models, such as co-working spaces (created to address the previous slowdown in global economic conditions, prior to the pandemic).

Co-working spaces are in demand now, offering companies and organisations an opportunity to de-risk their CRE portfolio with shorter leases, or more flex-space, with easier get out clauses, which everyone wants now, after 18 months of the work-from-home (WFH) experiment.

What has fundamentally changed, for the first time in 100 years is the ability for people to truly ‘work anywhere and at any time’, and after 12-18 months many people have formed new habits. These shifts in working patterns will now formulate what the future workplace will look like, not technology, that will just enable the new model, as it has been doing already.

A big challenge for everyone going forward is how to truly realign the companies and organisations key business needs and objectives, with those of the staff and colleagues. As without this essential alignment, many will fail, as we cannot survive in today’s ever competitive business environment without embracing ‘change – the new normal for us all’.