About Mark Eltringham

Mark is the publisher of Workplace Insight, IN magazine, Works magazine and is the European Director of Work&Place journal. He has worked in the office design and management sector for over thirty years as a journalist, marketing professional, editor and consultant.

Posts by Mark Eltringham:

Video: how we need to break with the past to optimise what we do now

Video: how we need to break with the past to optimise what we do now

by • Comment, Facilities management, Technology

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Dave Coplin, the ‘Chief Envisioning Officer’ at Microsoft, explores with the RSA how we might apply technology in new ways to transform the way we work. He starts with a look at how we are constrained by the past, with the example of the QWERTY keyboard which was originally developed to slow typists down to stop keys jamming but is still the de facto input method for typists over a century later. Obviously there are very good commercial reasons why technology companies need to ‘envision’ this new world of flexible working but it’s an engaging presentation and honest enough when he argues against our obsession with specific aspects of work such as email at the expense of others.

Mobile devices set to outnumber humans as PC sales plummet

by • Facilities management, Technology, Workplace

IpadsOne of the sure fire ways to judge what is about to happen to the world’s workplaces is to watch what people are doing with their gadgets. So as two surveys are published that show the dramatic decline in the numbers of PCs being sold around the world, a report from Cisco has forecast that by the end of this year, the number of mobile devices in operation globally will exceed the human population for the first time. Of course, that could only be possible if everybody was carrying around a number of mobile gadgets and, sure enough, a related survey from Juniper Networks shows that the average person surveyed now uses five devices at home and at work with at least three connected to the Internet.

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UK firms want to stay in EU but majority favour employment law changes

by • Knowledge, News, Workplace

EU FlagA new report from the British Chambers of Commerce shows that while the majority of businesses still favour the UK’s ongoing membership of the European Union, the majority would like to see significant changes in certain key legislative areas including employment law, health and safety regulations and regional development. The EU Business Barometer from the BCC gathered responses from around 4,400 firms of all sizes and from a range of sectors and found that over half (54 per cent) wanted changes to employment law, a similar proportion wanted changes to Health and Safety laws (46 per cent) and a third changes to policies related to regional development.

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Report claims empty offices could provide 11,500 homes

by • Knowledge, News, Property

Empty officesAccording to new research from Lambert Smith Hampton, there is nearly 12m sq. ft of obsolete office space in the UK’s regional markets which the firm estimates could yield as much as 7.4m sq. ft. of space suitable for conversion to residential use under the Government’s controversial new planning rules. The researchers claim that this equates to approximately 11,500 new homes. The government has relaxed the planning systems in the UK to encourage developers to shift the use of space although critics have argued that this may serve to distort the market for property in some areas as residential properties are potentially more lucrative than commercial properties.

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When the world’s cities became the stars of the show

by • Architecture, Comment

Andreas GurskyThe City has always been source of fascination for artists. The growth of cities in the 20th Century was paralleled by their growing depiction in art. Whereas early paintings from the likes of Edward Hopper and the photogravure prints of Alfred Stieglitz would invariably focus on individuals  within the context of the city, as the century wore on the cities themselves became the focus. Film was the natural medium for the new starring role of the City. Fritz Lang’s Metropolis was seminal in its depiction of the eponymous city and throughout the 20th Century camera lenses continued to fall in love with the likes of Paris (Jean Luc Godard’s Alphaville), New York (Martin Scorsese’s Mean Streets) and a future Los Angeles (Blade Runner from Ridley Scott).

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Flexible working arrangements could help law firms attract talent

by • Facilities management, Knowledge, News, Workplace

Legal journalsA new report from recruitment consultants Douglas Scott claims that a greater use of flexible working in the UK’s law firms would help them attract and retain the best employees. The survey of staff from firms across the UK  found that while only 19 per cent of employees currently enjoy flexible working, nearly half (43%) of respondents claimed flex-time is at the top of their wish list of employment benefits. The survey note a deal of variation across law firms with 73 per cent of public sector employees already on some form of flexible arrangement, compared to just 16 per cent across the board and only 13.6 per cent in the top 100 firms. Flexible working is enjoyed by more senior people with 20 per cent  of qualified candidates enjoying flexible working compared to 7 per cent of support staff.

Report highlights changing occupier demands in City of London property

by • Knowledge, News, Property

City of London coat of arms by GuildhallA new report from DTZ has outlined the ways in which the City of London property market is changing in response to occupier demand. As has been revealed in previous recent surveys, one of the most significant factors is a shift in focus away from the City’s traditional financial services heartland towards the technology, media and telecoms (TMT) sector.  Other structural changes include greater demand for different types of facilities from law firms as the legal sector adjusts to developments in its own market. The broader base of tenants and the expected economic upturn will mean a gradual improvement in demand although the report concedes that even by 2017, the market will not have returned to its peak.

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Video: people feel good at work when they know it has meaning

by • Facilities management, Workplace, Workplace design

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More evidence stacks up about what motivates people, including in the workplace. One thing that all the research shows about how to help people feel good at work is that motivation is a complex issue. It is not about money or joy or fun or an easy life. The things that are important include the challenge of overcoming difficult problems, a sense of achievement and an understanding that the work they do is acknowledged and makes a genuine contribution. The one thing to avoid is futility and the thing to aim for is meaning even in small ways. All of this research challenges the assumption that people are essentially economic creatures and that we can make them feel better by making isolated changes to their working environment.

Why we might all get more done if we did things more slowly

by • Comment, Technology

Tree OctopusThe idea that for every action there is a reaction applies just as much in culture as it does in physics. So just as life speeds up to the point where it is self-evident that many people are struggling to keep pace with its most basic demands, a small number of people are looking at ways of putting on the brakes. Most famously in 2004, the Canadian Carl Honoré established the Slow Movement. James Gleick was banging the same drum with his book Faster. We could all hope that as a result of such people asking for the brakes to be applied, things would slow down just a little now our attention had been drawn to the problem so that we could all feel a little better, take time to do things properly and maybe even do them better.

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The latest edition of the Insight newsletter is now online

by • Facilities management, Legal news, News, Newsletter, Property, Technology, Workplace, Workplace design

2.Insight_twitter_logo smThe April 10 edition of the Insight newsletter is now available to view online covering a range of themes from commercial property to ergonomics, human resources to workplace technology, office design to legislation, all done with the usual verve and willingness to tackle issues in a genuinely engaging and unique way. Office Insight is already the most widely read publication in the UK dedicated to workplace design and management with up to 1,000 unique readers daily. The online newsletter is available to read here and it’s quick and easy to subscribe through the main website if you don’t receive a copy already.

What the CIFF 2013 show taught us about workplaces in China

by • Comment, Flooring, Furniture, Workplace design

CIFF 2013You can tell a lot about how we work by the things with which we choose to surround ourselves. That is why it always pays to keep an eye on the world’s major office products shows. So, while eyes are trained on Milan this week for the international furniture fair, John Sacks offers us a view from the world’s largest exhibition CIFF which took place late last month in Guangzhou. Ignore the show’s dreadful website, this was a vast and important exhibition which tells us much about in the world’s second largest economy. Over 900 companies exhibited at CIFF in a venue with over 210,000 sq. m. of floor space and more than 60,000 people were expected to visit. The report can be seen here.

Office design goes to the movies. Part 7 – The Apartment

Office design goes to the movies. Part 7 – The Apartment

by • Comment, Facilities management, Workplace design

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In which Jack Lemmon exchanges the crushing uniformity of the open plan for a corner office as a reward for allowing senior managers to use his apartment as a venue for their infidelity. This is from 1960, the pre-cubicle, pre-VDU world of large ranks of serried workers in an open plan office with only the privileged few allowed any degree of privacy or the wherewithal to display status. many ways, the layout has much in common with the way many offices are designed now. Office design may have moved on in the past half century but some things are always with us.

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