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:

HMRC signs for Manchester HQ as part of nationwide programme of lettings

HMRC signs for Manchester HQ as part of nationwide programme of lettings

by • News, Property, Public Sector

HMRC has completed a 25 year letting of 157,153 sq ft at the English Cities Fund’s New Bailey development in Greater Manchester. HMRC will take over the whole of the seven storey 3 New Bailey development with staff moving in from 2022. The move is part of a nationwide programme of lettings in major cities to deliver HMRC services at local level, overseen by the Government Property Unit. There have already been announcement of new HMRC hubs in Cardiff, Edinburgh, Leeds and Birmingham. The New Bailey move will form the initial phase of the HMRC Manchester Regional Centre. Additional capacity for around 2,500 staff working in the city will be retained at Trinity Bridge House as a transitional site until 2027/8, when the second phase of the regional centre is expected to open. More →

Local authorities and developers must work together to boost the quality of new developments, says Green Building Council

Local authorities and developers must work together to boost the quality of new developments, says Green Building Council

by • News, Property

The UK Green Building Council (UKGBC) has launched two new resources for developers and local authorities designed to help boost construction standards and improve ‘social value outcomes’.  The first resource is related to residential developments while the second is directly relevant to commercial property. The resource, Social Value in New Development, provides guidance for developers and local authorities to help deliver social value outcomes in new residential and commercial developments. The guidance looks at social value, its stakeholders, strategies for driving positive outcomes and measuring success, and the current barriers to delivery.

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Flexible working and the rise of coworking reducing demand for London office space

Flexible working and the rise of coworking reducing demand for London office space

by • Coworking, Flexible working, News, Property

The number of new office buildings constructed since the financial crisis in 2008 has fallen in a year on year comparison by 56 percent, according to an analysis of planning applications carried out by property lending platform Lendy. The authors claim that the primary reason for the sharp decrease has been the greater uptake of flexible working and coworking models of space use. According to the study, only 2,300 applications to build new office buildings were approved last year, down from 5,200 in 2007/8. Lendy adds that applications to build new offices have also fallen since the financial crisis – down 58 percent to 2,500 last year from 6,000 in 2007/08.  Flexible working has reduced the requirement for new office buildings. Other innovations, such as shared workspace and coworking, have reduced the need for employees to have their own dedicated workspace, according to the report.

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New ruling means Australian workers will get five days of unpaid domestic violence leave

New ruling means Australian workers will get five days of unpaid domestic violence leave

by • Legal news, News, Wellbeing, Workplace

The Australian Fair Work Commission has ruled that all employees, including part time and temporary staff, will be entitled to five days of unpaid leave if they are affected by family or domestic violence, if they “need to do something to deal with the impact of family and domestic violence and it is impractical for them to do this outside of their ordinary hours of work”. The Fair Work Commission said that over the past year it had held a number of consultations to help it consider the most appropriate and balanced term for the new domestic violence leave entitlement. The Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) had suggested a number of possible models to the Commission, including the provision of 10 days of paid domestic violence leave for all employees. However, the Commission confirmed this week that a standard of five days leave is a “fair and relevant safety net entitlement”, adding that it has taken a “cautious regulatory response to this issue.”

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Property and construction industry calls on government to raise the bar on environmental standards

Property and construction industry calls on government to raise the bar on environmental standards

by • Environment, News, Property

Over 50 influential business leaders from across the construction and property industry have signed an open letter to ministers urging them to introduce policy that will see all new buildings built to net-zero carbon standards by 2030. As a first step towards the 2030 goal, the group calls on the government to swiftly confirm that from 2020 energy performance standards will be significantly improved. Coordinated by the UK Green Building Council (UKGBC), the letter asks ministers to give the industry medium and long-term policy certainty, to drive significant investment and catalyse innovation.

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Growing disconnect between pay and workplace effort, claims report

Growing disconnect between pay and workplace effort, claims report

by • Cities, News, Workplace

Exclusive polling undertaken by YouGov for Localis showed exactly half of those surveyed felt they were paid less than they deserved, a third (31 percent) paid roughly the right amount and 7 percent felt overpaid. The polling figures also indicated nearly two thirds (61 percent) of people felt unrewarded for hard work. The findings are contained in a report entitled ‘The Delivery of an Industrial Strategy – Raising prosperity across England’ which examines how strategic authorities, such as Mayoral Combined Authorities and county councils, can take the industrial strategy forward at a local level to raise local prosperity and living standards. More →

Seven workplace stories that fired up our synapses this week

Seven workplace stories that fired up our synapses this week

by • Features, Flexible working, Property, Technology, Workplace design

Three myths about the future of work and why they’re not true

Chronic fatigue trial results ‘not robust’, new study says

Coworking is the new normal and the stats that prove it

Is mindfulness just hype?

What makes employees happy?

The workplace is killing people and nobody cares

The office sector is failing to keep up with business growth

Image: The Cluster, Melbourne

Activity and a positive attitude are best treatments for back pain, claims major new study

Activity and a positive attitude are best treatments for back pain, claims major new study

by • News, Wellbeing

Although lower back pain is the leading cause of disability worldwide, affecting an estimated 540 million people at any one time, it is often mistreated, according to a new series of papers in The Lancet medical journal. The series provides evidence that back pain should be managed with activity, in the workplace and in primary care. However, a high proportion of patients worldwide are treated in emergency departments, encouraged to rest and stop work, are referred for scans and surgery or prescribed pain killers including opioids. The authors claim this is at best pointless and at worst harmful. Exercise and psychological therapy are the only things that work for the majority of cases of chronic back pain but too many people wrongly believe the idea that rest is best for the condition, according to the authors. The series of papers also concludes that job satisfaction and a positive attitude are among the strongest indicators of how well people will overcome chronic back pain and related issues.

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Action is needed to protect commercial property driving growth of UK cities

Action is needed to protect commercial property driving growth of UK cities

by • News

A new report from the Centre for Cities think tank outlines the scale of urban transformation in big Northern and Midlands cities over recent decades and its dependence on the ready availability of commercial property. The report, City Space Race, shows that the number of people living and working in Manchester, Leeds and Birmingham city centres has soared in comparison to other cities across the country but also warns that planning reforms are needed to enable these cities to provide both the commercial space and housing they need to continue to thrive. The report, sponsored by law firm DAC Beachcroft, examines the challenges British cities face in managing competing demands for residential and commercial space – especially in their city centres, where high skilled, high paying businesses increasingly choose to locate.

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Occupiers seeking tech, flexibility and wellness in a newly consumerised workplace

Occupiers seeking tech, flexibility and wellness in a newly consumerised workplace

by • Flexible working, News, Property, Technology

Nearly two-thirds of  corporate occupiers (62 percent) plan to increase their investment in real estate technology over the next three years, most of them in the next year, according to the 2018 EMEA Occupier Survey from CBRE. Companies are intending to invest more heavily in new real estate technologies over the short to medium term in order to enhance the user experience and raise workforce productivity. This represents a clear move away from aiming real estate technology at purely operational goals such as energy management.

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Working fathers are being let down by workplace policies, claims Government report

Working fathers are being let down by workplace policies, claims Government report

by • Flexible working, News

The Government’s Women and Equalities Committee has published its report on fathers in the workplace. Its main conclusion is that current policies supporting fathers in the workplace do not deliver what they promise, despite good intentions and this is particularly the case for less well-off fathers. It claims that the Government must reform workplace policies to ensure they meet the needs of the 21st century family and to better support working dads in caring for their children, say MPs. The report concludes that the right to request flexible working has not created the necessary cultural change and the Government itself admitted to the inquiry that its flagship shared parental leave scheme will not meet its objective for most fathers.

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Seven of the best stories about life, the universe and everything we’ve seen over the past week

Seven of the best stories about life, the universe and everything we’ve seen over the past week

by • Features, Technology, Wellbeing, Workplace design

People don’t actually know themselves very well

Some actual facts about the time we spend sitting at work

German workers: satisfied, but not engaged

What skills and behaviours make a good leader effective?

Stephen Hawking’s most dire predictions for the future

The World’s happiest nations, according to the UN

A critique of the dogma of wellbeing

Image: By NASA/Paul Alers [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

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