Covid-19 has caused a great deal of disruption for many businesses in the UK. This has caused a knock-on effect whereby office space requirements for organisations has significantly reduced and businesses are looking to consolidate their work environments.
Consolidating office space means bringing together multiple offices into one place, and there are many benefits to this approach, especially if you consider what we believe to be the future of office space becoming large business lounges, these give more flexibility and encourages your team to come to the workspace to collaborate, and be mentored/guided, whilst encouraging a sense of belonging, with all the technologies and behaviours they have gained with the recently imposed home working:
Bringing together multiple offices into one space means you technically only need one of everything. For example, you can centralise the storage area, kitchen and break rooms. A single but larger office space also means better space efficiency, which often translates to lower operational costs for a
Amalgamating workspace means creating a more seamless working environment for staff and management. For example, a seamless work environment with a larger space will ensure more efficient layout plans can be executed, this can open up the opportunity for a company to implement agile work spaces which will increase employee productivity and improve teamwork.
Having one large office space provides businesses the opportunity to streamline their communication, knowledge transfers and workflows, and aids in creating synergies between departments and employees. Also, having managers under one roof could improve employee accountability, leading to greater productivity. These factors will contribute to a more positive employee attitude towards the company.
A strong company culture is the backbone of a successful organisation. A company culture that is nurtured correctly will contribute to employees feeling motivated and positive towards their role. However, nurturing this culture is easier when employees share the same workspace. A shared working environment also ensures corporate strategy is clear and concise amongst the team and a consistent employee experience will be encountered.
Larger office spaces create greater leverage in terms of negotiation with the landlord. For example, there may come a time when you want to sublet any unused space, and this is more likely to be agreed upon if the business is situated within a larger office space.
As with any major changes to a company, consolidating offices space will pose some challenges. The main one being bringing various networks of people together under one roof. Even if a group of employees work for the same company, if they have worked in two separate offices, their office dynamics may be completely different. Therefore, coming together may cause conflict or unease amongst the new team. To tackle this, it could be a good idea for the company to organise numerous team bonding activities and get-togethers before the big move, this way everyone can get to know each other a bit more and when everyone is back in the shared office the workforce will know exactly what to expect from each other.