July 16, 2018
A bunch of coworking startups saying the same things about how different they are
Mass incompetency in business: the way we promote people is dead wrong
Want to discover (or re-discover) your sense of purpose at work?
Is stress at work always a bad thing?
Augmented space planning: Using procedural generation to automate desk layouts
A Stanford researcher says we shouldn’t start working full time until age 40
July 13, 2018
Connectivity is more than just broadband speeds and 4G coverage. New research from property consultancy Cluttons claims to reveal the impact it has on everything from the properties we choose to live in, to the places where we can work and our overall happiness both at home and in the office. The research suggests that London is lagging behind other national and global hubs when it comes to good connectivity in both residential and commercial property, failing our needs both as residents and businesses.
July 11, 2018
The British Council for Offices (BCO) today welcomes Katrina Kostic Samen as its new President. Katrina Kostic Samen, Founder and Managing Partner at KKS Strategy, formally takes over the position from Ken Shuttleworth, Founding Partner of Make Architects, at the BCO’s Annual General Meeting in London today, Wednesday 11th July. As Chair of the BCO Annual Conference held earlier this year in Berlin, Katrina set out the vision for her Presidential year, challenging delegates to look at the workplace from multiple occupier perspectives, and to ensure that they are designing and delivering offices which are inclusive and provide for a diverse workforce.
July 11, 2018
Liverpool’s Avenue HQ has been crowned ‘National Co-Working Space of the Year’ by The Association of Independent Professionals and the Self-Employed (IPSE). The award claims to ‘recognise and celebrate the important role coworking spaces play in creating a nurturing, inclusive and stimulating environment for the UK’s 4.8 million-strong self-employed workforce’. The coworking industry is booming globally as companies of all sizes recognise the importance of working environment on employee and business performance. Pioneered by start-ups, entrepreneurs and freelancers, a growing number of companies, large and small, are incorporating the concept and rapidly reaping the benefits.
July 11, 2018
Wellness is a term that today transcends the consumer and business worlds, but it is so much more than a buzzword. Today, the wellbeing of employees is essential for organisations to flourish, so much so that the term has in many ways replaced ‘productivity’ as the way to measure the success of an organisation. Both the beauty and workplace design sectors are very personal areas of high emotional involvement. There is a very real and physical contact with these products — in beauty, women are particularly (and increasingly men too) engaged in developing a customised routine because it gives them a sense of happiness, wellbeing and identity.
July 10, 2018
Improved living standards, deflating pension pots and legal protection against age discrimination have all helped to nudge up the retirement age. The result is that for the first time since the Industrial Revolution five generations of employees are now working side by side. According to a new survey, two thirds of organisations (66 per cent) say that an age diverse workforce helped the company to have a more comprehensive skillset and knowledge base and more than seven in ten (71 per cent) felt that a multi-generational workforce brought contrasting views to their organisation. However, in the YouGov survey of middle market businesses commissioned by RSM, four in ten companies (41 per cent) said that a multi-generational workforce also increased the risk of conflict in the workplace. More →
July 9, 2018
Academics at Henley Business School have revealed a growing trend in ‘side hustles’ which shows that as many as 1 in 4 people in the UK are running at least one business project alongside their main day job, contributing an estimated £72 billion to the UK economy. Henley has published a white paper on the emerging side hustle economy. Its study of over 500 business leaders and 1,100 UK adults found the trend is now happening at an unprecedented pace across the UK. A side hustle is defined as a secondary business or job that brings in, or has potential to bring in, extra income. 73 of people who start a side hustle do so to follow a passion or explore a new challenge, but there are financial benefits too, with side businesses contributing 20 percent to side hustlers’ income.
July 9, 2018
Hong Kong Central remains the most expensive office market in the world, according to CBRE’s annual Global Prime Office Occupancy Costs report. Hong Kong Central’s overall prime occupancy costs of US$307 per sq. ft. per year topped the “most expensive” list, followed by London West End (US$235 per sq. ft.), Beijing Finance Street (US$201 per sq. ft.), Hong Kong Kowloon (US$190 per sq. ft.) and Beijing Central Business District (US$189 per sq. ft.).
July 5, 2018
Members of the British Institute of Facilities Management have today voted to approve its Board’s recommendation to change the Institute’s name to the Institute of Workplace and Facilities Management (IWFM). A Manifesto for Change unveiled by Chairman Steve Roots on 1 March which set out to reframe facilities management by emphasising its ability to make a real contribution to organisations’ performance has been resoundingly supported by members who today voted overwhelmingly to adopt the new name.
July 5, 2018
The usual rationale for open plan offices is that they help people to collaborate more effectively. But this premise is challenged by a new study from researchers at Harvard Business School which suggests that employees at two large Fortune 500 companies actually engaged in less face-to-face contact after switching to entirely open workspaces. As published in the journal Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, Ethan Bernstein and Stephen Turban sought to conduct a real-world comparison of people’s behaviour in different types of offices to test a hypothesis that open plan layouts reduce communication.
July 5, 2018
Too few musicians draw inspiration from the office or office furniture, and for very good reasons. The main one being that one of the main reason to get into rock and roll is to avoid a desk in the first place. Nevertheless, it’s worth saying that the office is routinely used as both a setting and a symbol in movies even if workplaces are generally seen as mundane or dehumanising in stark contrast to whatever troubled romance / disaster is befalling the protagonist. Offices are usually depicted as dystopian (Brazil), soul-destroying (Office Space, American Beauty) or a backdrop for whatever else is going on (name your own romcom). More →
July 11, 2018
Challenging some of the most commonly held misconceptions about coworking
by John Williams • Comment, Coworking
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