Camille Tighe, strategist at architecture firm Vocon.
NEW YORK CITY – Employers are building out flexible workspaces to lure employees who have grown accustomed to working from home back into the office. Companies want to create a destination to increase office headcounts because face-to-face interaction remains essential for collaboration, and it happens best in groups, according to Camille Tighe, a workplace strategist at architecture firm Vocon.
Employees who work from home usually desire to have the flexibility and work balance that is most conducive to their work style, and this does not have to be done at home for optimal productivity, employers find. They're making their offices more accommodating, outfitting them with various conference spaces, private phone and individual work booths, according to Tighe.
"It's important to provide a broad range of individual-focused and collaborative space," she said. "You want to set up people with the right tools and execute enough construction to do it effectively, so it supports behaviors for mobile workers."
In today's work environment, on average employees have access to over 23 types of work settings to support an organization's diverse needs. Giving employees the option of both a mobile and resident work experience provides the freedom for them to move fluidly between a wide range of work settings, and choose space based on tasks at hand, according to Tighe.
"The work environment should offer a variety of spaces that accommodate privacy and focus alongside more open spaces that prioritize connection, collaboration and innovation," she said.
Before embarking on a design project that implements flexible workspace, Tighe likes to define what mobility means organizationally to the prospective company, and why they're pursuing the change, which has great institutional benefits, she said. "Considering real estate is the second largest expense aside from employee salary, developing the right value for employees can decrease costs of real estate and operating costs."
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Mariah Brown
Mariah Brown is the New York Bureau Chief and Real Estate Reporter for GlobeSt.com, covering the New York Metro area, Northeast region and national real estate trends. She is responsible for producing multi-media content, including articles, podcasts and video. Before joining the GlobeSt team, she served as a New York Times fellow, reported for the Associated Press in New York and Philadelphia and several other New York City-based outlets.
