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:

March 5, 2013

UK central government fails to increase spending with SMEs

by Mark Eltringham • Facilities management, Knowledge, News, Public Sector

The Cabinet Office has published figures for how much the UK’s central government departments spent on products and services from small and medium enterprises during the year 2011/2012. The low key announcement slipped under the radar for many people, possibly because the figures indicate that the government is very unlikely to hit its target of spending a quarter of its total expenditure with SMEs in the course of this parliament. While it’s inevitable that large areas of government spending are unsuitable for supply from smaller businesses, the Cabinet Office will be concerned that the current total of 10 per cent is way short of its expectations.

March 5, 2013

Challenge for Ecobuild is reducing greenwash and white noise

by Mark Eltringham • Architecture, Comment, Environment, Facilities management, Workplace design

Today is the first day of Ecobuild, which claims to be the world’s largest exhibition dedicated to sustainable construction and fit-out. Some 1,500 organisations are taking part in the event in East London which last year attracted 58,000 visitors from around the world. While undoubtedly successful, influential, with great intellectual content and a showcase for some truly innovative and effective products, the approach of Ecobuild invariably begs the question: in a world in which every supplier claims to be environmentally friendly, how are their customers expected to make the right choices?

March 4, 2013

Liverpool and London regeneration projects get green light

by Mark Eltringham • News, Property

Liverpool Waters

Two huge regeneration projects, one in Liverpool and one in London, have been approved today. The Community Secretary Eric Pickles gave the uncontested go-ahead for the £5.5 billion Liverpool Waters scheme at the same time as London Mayor Boris Johnson green lit the £1.5 billion regeneration of the 23 acre Heygate Estate in Elephant and Castle, South London. Both will provide a much need fillip to the UK’s moribund construction sector, creating thousands of new jobs as well as thousands of new homes, offices, shops, restaurants and other buildings in rundown areas of the two cities.

March 4, 2013

UK building sector contracts again but there may be light at end of tunnel

by Mark Eltringham • Knowledge, News, Property

The UK’s construction sector has continued its recent pattern of contraction according to the latest survey of the Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) from Markit/CIPS UK. The last month’s index, published earlier today, showed at 46.8, where a figure below 50 indicates a decline in activity, marking the most significant monthly downturn since October 2009. The fall is the fourth consecutive monthly fall although there was a contrast between the commercial sector which endured the biggest drop and residential building which rose slightly.

March 4, 2013

Nearly all UK employers now offer flexible working, claims survey

by Mark Eltringham • Knowledge, News, Workplace

A new report from the Institute of Leadership and Management claims that as many as 94 per cent of UK employers now offer staff some form of flexible working arrangement. The study of more than 1,100 UK managers found that around three quarters (73 per cent) of respondents said their organisation actively supported flexible work practices, 82 per cent were aware of the benefits of flexible working and nearly two thirds (62 per cent) said that senior managers led schemes by example. There is still work to be done in gaining universal acceptance however with 50 per cent of managers claiming flexible working is now standard practice .

March 3, 2013

Dull workplaces can hamper creativity, claims new report

by Mark Eltringham • Furniture, Knowledge, News, Workplace design

A new report from London based fit-out company Overbury claims that dull and demotivating workplaces are holding back creativity in UK organisations. The study of 2,000 employees from across the UK, found that although staff consider idea generation crucial to their employer’s performance, many feel unable to work creatively together in their offices. Between half and two thirds of employees (59%) state that the development of new ideas is vital to their organisation. However, many respondents also stated that their working environment is thwarting creativity,with the majority (52%) of UK offices lacking common or social areas.

March 2, 2013

Google and Yahoo office strategies teach us the value of the velvet glove

by Mark Eltringham • Comment, Facilities management, Technology, Workplace, Workplace design

It’s a week now since the whole Yahoo-ha kicked off and since that time everybody has had their say on the matter including – refreshingly – those in the mainstream media. The story has followed its own narrative arc, from the initial gasps of horror at Yahoo’s audacious challenge to a cherished piece of contemporary received wisdom (coupled with the reminder that Yahoo still exists) to something more thoughtful and circumspect as we learned more about the thinking behind the decision.What has become apparent is that Yahoo’s actions were based on a tacit understanding that people work better on certain tasks when they are together.

March 1, 2013

Working ‘proper hours’ may no longer be possible

by Mark Eltringham • Comment, Knowledge, Workplace

Today is the Trades Union Congress’s self-styled ‘Work Your Proper Hours Day’. Last week the TUC announced that it had used Government statistics to calculate that more than 5 million UK employees put in an average of over 7 hours of unpaid overtime a week, adding around £28 billion a year to the economy. Like me, you might be surprised the figures are that low and certainly I think a lot of people would be delighted to only put in an extra 7 hours a week. You might also be dismayed the TUC is advocating workers add less of their time into the economy by clocking off on time today. However, the bigger problem is surely with the language and ideas put forward by the TUC.

February 28, 2013

Workplace Anachronisms: No. 1 – the BCO Specification Guide

by Mark Eltringham • Comment, Facilities management, Property, Workplace design

The British Council for Offices claims that it is ‘Britain’s leading forum for the discussion and debate of issues affecting the office sector. Its members are organisations involved in creating, acquiring or occupying office space, whether architects, lawyers, surveyors, financial institutions or public agencies.’ If true, this makes its Specification Guide all the more remarkable for not only being wide of the mark about at least one key issue when it was published back in 2009, but about which it is growing increasingly redundant by the day.

February 28, 2013

UK centralised public sector purchasing – still work to do

by Mark Eltringham • Knowledge, News, Public Sector

The National Audit Office today publishes its report Improving Government Procurement. The mainstream media will doubtless stay focussed on the headline examples of ‘waste’, especially in high-spending and high-profile departments such as the MOD and NHS. But for the public sector and its suppliers there is more to be concerned about in one of the main conclusions of the report; that less than half of public sector spending in the UK is carried out across departments to take advantage of economies of scale. That this is the case has long been a source of frustration for those suppliers signed up to framework agreements who find that things aren’t as clear cut as they believe when it comes to purchasing decisions.

February 27, 2013

Generation Y employees see themselves as risk averse

by Mark Eltringham • Knowledge, News, Workplace

The Generation that put the Y in N-E-E-D-Y is the subject of yet another survey, this time one reporting that its members view themselves as less entrepreneurial and more risk averse than either Generation X (30-49 year olds) and the baby boomer generation (50-69). The survey of nearly 3,000 people by monster.com and Millennial Branding found that just under a third (32%) of Gen Y workers consider themselves to be entrepreneurial, compared to 41% of Gen X staff and 45% of baby boomers. Similarly 28% of Millennial respondents identified themselves as not being averse to risk compared to 40% of Gen X and 43% of boomers.

February 26, 2013

UAE’s infrastructure investment drives rapid construction sector growth

by Mark Eltringham • Knowledge, News, Property

The full impact of high levels of government spending as well as private sector and foreign investment in infrastructure and development in the Gulf is evident in a new report from analysts RNCOS which claims that the construction sector in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) is set to grow from its current size of $39.4bn at the end of 2012 by a compound rate of 9.5% a year until 2016. The report breaks the market down into four major areas of development; retail, residential, office and hospitality. The follow on effects for firms offering products and services will, of course, also be substantial.