Search Results for: environment

Keeping remote employees motivated is key to successful flexible working culture

by • Comment, Flexible working, Workplace

Flexible working has barely been out of the news since the latest government changes. But while allowing employees to work remotely can do wonders for staff retention, motivating them and keeping them in the loop presents a new problem. Although self-starting employees feel that they have more control over their work and fewer distractions, it can also lead to a sense of isolation. It is important for retention that you not just offer a flexible working option to employees, but that all the staff make an effort to continue allowing them to feel like a part of the team. The four best practices that will help you motivate employees that telecommute are: ensuring you build trust between those who telecommute and their colleagues from the start; establish regular communication between remote and in-office staff; manage goals, expectations and outcomes and take steps to establish that remote working is made part of the company culture. (more…)

The latest Workplace Insight newsletter is available to view online

by • Facilities management, Newsletter, Work&Place, Workplace design

Workplace InsightIn the latest copy of the Workplace Insight newsletter available to view online; Chris Kane argues that people and place are a company’s most valuable assets and only by developing them both in tandem will you unlock their true value. We reveal that far from improving their work/life balance, flexible working means nearly half of managers work an extra day each week; the Dutch beat the Germans in workplace happiness and productivity levels, and the UK’s public sector spends almost twice as much on outsourced services as the country’s private sector. The BBC announces plans to move more staff out of its central London offices as part of its strategy to reduce property costs, and news of a transformation in the way the US corporate real estate market approaches the environmental performance of buildings. We also include a link to the new issue of Work&Place, the journal we publish in partnership with Occupiers Journal.

6 Bevis Marks, the Gherkin’s new neighbour, is ready for tenants

by • Company news, Facilities management, Property, Workplace design

6 Bevis marks ready for tenants6 Bevis Marks – next to the Gherkin in the City of London – has been completed, with the first two tenants expected to take occupation in August. The mixed use building comprises 160,000 sqft (14,864 sqm) of office and retail space over 15 floors, and has been developed in a joint venture between AXA Real Estate and BlackRock. Located close to Liverpool Street, where the new Crossrail station is due to open in 2018, the building features a rooftop garden square, a ground floor business lounge, full on-site cyclist facilities and a private landscaped courtyard with access to the public realm surrounding the Gherkin. The development also features a 26-screen media wall in the reception, which is being used to host the Vivid Digital arts programme – a commission of young filmmaking talent supported by the developer. The building is BREEAM Excellent rated, with a range of sustainability features. (more…)

Smithfield mixed use development plans thrown out by Communities Secretary

by • Architecture, News, Property, Workplace design

SmithfieldThe UK’s Communities secretary Eric Pickles has – in no uncertain terms – thrown out the controversial £160m plans to redevelop London’s historic Smithfield Market. The development, which would have been located in the heart of London’s creative and office design communities, was rejected with a strongly worded statement that concluded: ‘the extent of damage that the application would cause to the important heritage assets at Smithfield runs entirely counter to national and policy objectives intended to protect such assets from harm and that this would seriously undermine any economic, social or environmental benefits otherwise arising from the development, such that the proposal would not represent sustainable development.’ Objections to  the plans had been led by the Victorian Society and Save Britain’s Heritage and enjoyed the backing of high profile public figures such as Alan Bennett, Kristin Scott Thomas and RIBA Journal editor Hugh Pearman.

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UK’s men and women have significantly different attitudes toward flexible working

by • Flexible working, News, Workplace

Attitudes to flexible workingAs we have seen, the implementation of new flexible working legislation in the UK at the end of June has already shone a spotlight into some intriguing corners of the nation’s workplace. The latest revelation, according to a new survey from recruitment firm Kelly Services, is that men and women have markedly different attitudes towards the idea. While just over half (51 percent)of the UK’s female workers believe that the chance of flexible working would make an organisation a more attractive employer, just over a third of their male counterparts (36 percent) feel the same way. Similarly, a fifth of women surveyed (20  percent) would consider moving job in search of flexible working arrangements compared 15 percent of men and nearly two thirds of women (62 percent) believe  their ideal working environment would include flexible working arrangements compared to under half of men (49 percent).

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Green building design ‘goes mainstream’ in major US cities

Green building design ‘goes mainstream’ in major US cities

by • Architecture, Environment, News, Property, Workplace design

Green building design

Minneapolis – the home of US green building design

It’s not just Europe that is experiencing an explosion of interest in green building design. According to a new report from CBRE and Maastricht University, the past ten years have seen a transformation in the way the US corporate real estate market approaches the environmental performance of buildings. According to the National Green Building Adoption Index for 2014, produced by CBRE there has been a remarkable increase in the  application of green building standards in the thirty most important regional commercial property markets in the US. Based on data from the US Green Building Council,  the number of office buildings which are LEED* or Energy Star** certified has surged since 2005. The proportion of LEED certified buildings in America now stands at 5 percent, up from under 0.5 percent over the course of the survey period. The total proportion  of office space which now has some form of green accreditation is just under a fifth.

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The latest issue of the Insight newsletter is available to view online

by • Newsletter

The latest edition of the Insight newsletter is now available to view onlineIn the latest copy of the Insight newsletter; Gavin Bradley explains how a new campaign could help reduced the ill health that is caused by spending too much time sitting and Professor Franklin Becker of Cornell University asks why do many corporates invest millions in their workplaces and not bother to measure results? Paul Statham, the MD of Condeco urges the Government to act on the growing issue of wasted commercial property space in Greater London and Bostjan Ljubicis, the VP of Steelcase UK and Ireland argues the physical workplace can provide an environment in which people can thrive. In news; research shows around a third of all BYOD activity is invisible to the IT department and in the week that the right to request flexible working is extended, we reveal how flexible hours could help reduce the number of people who admit to have pulled a ‘sickie.’ We also include a link to the new issue of Work&Place, the journal we publish in partnership with Occupiers Journal.

EU sustainable building proposals will raise green credentials of property

by • Environment, Facilities management, News

sustainable buildingEU proposals to raise the sustainability of new and renovated buildings by increasing resource efficiency and improving information on their environmental performance have been welcomed by the World Green Building Council. Under the proposals, set out in Communication “Resource efficiency opportunities in the building sector”, builders, architects, product manufacturers, or anyone wanting to rent or buy a building will have access to better information about its environmental performance. The Commission will develop a framework for assessing environmental performance with the aim of providing a tool which can be used across Europe, by both private actors and public authorities in the development of sustainable building stock. The first set of indicators should be available in two to three years. Efforts to recycle construction and demolition waste, and to re-use it when constructing new buildings or renovating existing ones, will also be made easier under the plans.

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Workplace wellbeing increasingly incorporated into office design

by • Company news, Facilities management, Flexible working, Workplace design

Wellbeing considerations being incorporated into workplace designMore UK companies are proactively designing their workspaces with wellbeing in mind as the health and wellbeing of office workers soars up the list of business priorities. This is according to Bostjan Ljubic, the newly appointed head of Steelcase in the UK and Ireland, who believes the economic impact of employee wellbeing, plus greater understanding of the issue is now propelling companies to develop and enhance their engagement with their workforces, as they increase their post-recession drive to attract and retain high quality staff. “The issue of wellbeing has developed very significantly in recent times,” said Ljubic. “Businesses that are focusing clearly on the issue are doing so because they have identified the potential emotional, financial and competitive advantage. The mountain of research on wellbeing points very clearly to it being in a company’s interests to take the matter seriously.” (more…)

The ties that bind facilities management with workplace design

by • Comment, Facilities management, Workplace design

Facilities management and workplace designThere is an ongoing feeling within the facilities management discipline that when it comes to the design of workplaces, the majority of facilities managers are not consulted early enough or well enough or consistently enough to ensure that the end result of the design process is a workplace that is as functional and as effective as it could be. The reason this feeling persists is that in many cases it is true. Or at least is true to a greater or lesser extent depending on how you view these things. And if that sounds woolly, then you  have to remember we are talking about facilities management here, finding a definition for which has been like nailing jelly to a wall for many years. In many cases the demarcation between workplace design and workplace management is based on the mistaken idea that the two have little correlation when in fact the relationship between them should be more akin to that between sex and parenthood. One is an act of creation and the other of care, with the latter a direct consequence of the former.

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Where office workers would really like to work? Outdoors.

by • Company news, Furniture, Workplace design

office workers outdoorsLast year, we shared research from Overbury which suggested that what most people really wanted from their offices was for them to be a lot more like Starbucks. Now new research from Steelcase Solutions claims that what people would really like is to be working in bucolic splendour, or at least an indoor approximation of it. The survey of around 800 UK based office workers carried out by IPSOS claims that people would feel more optimistic about their work if natural light, more control of temperatures and informal, dynamic spaces were core elements of their working environments, which coincidentally are also important factors in fostering wellness and productivity. In addition, the authors of the report  claim that more offices in future will apply biophilic design principles to offer staff a daily glimpse (or illusion) of the great outdoors. (more…)

Four regional winners named in competition to find world’s best tall building for 2014

by • Architecture, News, Property

best tall buildingThe awards programmes pile up at this time of year and following the announcement of RIBA’s best workplaces for the year, four buildings, from the United States, Australia, the Netherlands and the United Arab Emirates, have been named the best tall building in the world for 2014 in their respective region by the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat (CTBUH). An overall winner for the “Best Tall Building Worldwide” will be named from the four regional winners, following presentations from the owners and architects of each building, at the CTBUH 13th Annual Awards Symposium, which will take place at the Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, on November 6. The symposium will be followed by the Awards Ceremony and Dinner in the iconic Crown Hall, designed by Mies van der Rohe. The 10-Year, Urban Habitat, Lifetime Achievement, Building Performance and Innovation awards will be announced in the coming weeks, and will also feature at November’s awards events.

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