Search Results for: office design

Siemens new Swiss campus showcases workplace technology and use of BIM in construction

Siemens new Swiss campus showcases workplace technology and use of BIM in construction

by • Case studies, Company news, Facilities management, Technology, Workplace design

Siemens AG has officially opened its new campus in Zug, Switzerland. The Siemens Zug campus features a new office building with 1,000 work spaces and a newly constructed production building. The investment volume for new buildings, renovations and related measures amounts to CHF 250 million. The campus is the international headquarters of the Siemens Building Technologies (BT) Division, which has 29,000 employees. Construction of the office and production buildings began in May 2016 and was completed in July 2018. The Siemens Zug campus is one of the first new projects to use Building Information Modeling (BIM) for design and construction. The digital twin – a 3D model of the building, enhanced with technical information relevant for later operations – is the foundation for efficient, cost-optimised and forward-looking building management. (more…)

New guidance on labour standards and workers rights published

New guidance on labour standards and workers rights published

by • News

The International Bar Association Global Employment Institute and the International Organisation of Employers have published new guidance for firms on International Labour Standards (ILS). The ILS are legal instruments, set by the International Labour Organization (ILO) which protect basic workers rights and address the need for sustainable enterprises to create jobs. They are either conventions, which are legally binding international treaties  or recommendations which serve as non-binding guidelines.

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Majority of UK employees want Britain to adopt French out-of-hours email ban

Majority of UK employees want Britain to adopt French out-of-hours email ban

by • Flexible working, Legal news, News, Technology, Wellbeing, Workplace

Majority of UK employees want Britain to adopt French out-of-hours email banOver a third (35 percent) of UK workers continue to work when then get home from the office, claims research from Insurance2go into whether British workers are struggling to stick to working within their designated office hours. The survey found that a third (35 percent) of continue to answer work email or conduct work tasks on their personal mobile phones when they get home from work, a quarter (25 percent) do the same during their lunch break, and just under a quarter (23 percent) have said they work on their personal handsets on their commute. Meanwhile, across the channel, French employees have been given the legal right to ignore work emails outside of working hours, with companies of over 50 workers providing a charter of good conduct, setting out the hours when staff are not supposed to send or answer emails. When asked if the UK should follow-suit, 65 percent of workers were in favour, implying a strain on British staff and an expectation to be ‘always on’ even in non-working hours.

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OECD, UN Environment and World Bank call for a radical shift in infrastructure thinking

OECD, UN Environment and World Bank call for a radical shift in infrastructure thinking

by • Cities, Environment, News

The OECD, UN Environment and World Bank Group have this week called on leaders of G20 countries to do more to enable a radical shift of investment into low-carbon, climate-resilient infrastructure as a way to limit the impact of climate change. Delivering a new report, Financing Climate Futures: Rethinking Infrastructure, to the G20 at its Summit in Buenos Aires, the three International Organisations said governments need to adopt a more transformative agenda on low-carbon, climate-resilient investments if they are to meet the Paris Agreement goal of cutting CO2emissions to net zero in the second half of the century and build resilience to climate change.

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The meaning of life, the Black Mirror of Beijing, standing desks not a silver bullet and some other stuff

The meaning of life, the Black Mirror of Beijing, standing desks not a silver bullet and some other stuff

by • Features

So, what is the meaning of life? According to a study by Pew, the gold standard US based researchers, it’s spending time with family and friends, reading, listening to music and going for a walk in the open air. Work comes somewhere down the list. Just one-third of the survey’s respondents mentioned their career or job as a source of meaning, and only a quarter cite finances or money. This, it turns out, is not too far off Monty Python’s conclusion in their eponymous film:  Try and be nice to people, avoid eating fat, read a good book every now and then, get some walking in, and try and live together in peace and harmony with people of all creeds and nations. That’s that sorted then.

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Are you ready for the world of agile working we will experience in the 2020s?

Are you ready for the world of agile working we will experience in the 2020s?

by • Comment, Facilities management, Workplace design

Some organisations believe they have ‘done’ Agile Working. They have increased the ratio of people to desks and achieved a saving in accommodation costs. They have provided flexible working arrangements across the organisation and have enabled their people to work at home for part of their working week. Staff surveys show employees are pleased with the opportunities and benefits this provides them. But organisations cannot afford to become comfortable or complacent, there are greater opportunities to grasp. As in any transformation initiative, Agile Working is more than a project it is a cultural journey involving continuing change to achieve continuous improvement. Agile Working is moving on.

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Fostering creativity within organisations through space and culture

Fostering creativity within organisations through space and culture

by • Comment, Workplace design

In organisations around the world, hierarchical structures are breaking down, replaced by deeply interconnected, constantly shifting networks, linked by innovative technology. Meanwhile, huge leaps forward in artificial intelligence promise to fundamentally change the nature of work, either by enhancing or replacing human-beings. Research by McKinsey suggests that half of today’s work activities could be automated by 2055, with repetitive and process-based roles the first to go. For employees, this looks likely to mean a greater focus on creative skills, where humans retain an advantage. These skills are not restricted to being purely artistic, as creativity describes the process of problem-solving in a new way. The rise of creativity is also being driven by new generations entering the workplace with different demands and expectations than those before them.

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Is leadership the missing variable in the productivity equation?

Is leadership the missing variable in the productivity equation?

by • News

Quality of leadership is reported to be the single most important factor to impact the level of productivity in an organisation according to a new international research study. The report, The Puzzle of Productivity: What enhances workplace performance? was compiled by the Fourfront Group, The United Workplace (TUW) and WORKTECH Academy. It found that more than half of respondents surveyed (53 percent) named leadership as the most important factor in raising organisational performance. Less than a fifth of respondents named environment, technology or wellness as being the most important factor. Environment came second to leadership, but a long way behind on 18 per cent of the survey. More than half of the organisations surveyed worldwide (54 percent) said that ‘inspiring leadership’ is the best way to motivate staff to improve performance, whereas a ‘well designed workplace’ scored much lower on 19 percent with ‘a focus on wellness’ (14 percent) and ‘seamless tech’ (13 percent) even further down the field.

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What is in a name for the UK facilities management sector?

What is in a name for the UK facilities management sector?

by • Comment, Facilities management

Westminster. Home to fiery debate, unwavering scrutiny, calls for change, and cries of “Order! Order!”. Once again, RICS’s HQ, on Parliament Square, was jam-packed with a passionate and feisty crowd, panellists and audience alike, all set on pushing the industry conversation forward. While some were keen to maintain order during FMJ’s most recent RICS-IFMA debate concerning facility management’s place in the 21st century, others were set on redefining FM in order to pinpoint what this yet unestablished definition means for the future of the profession.

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The death of desks, the truth about smart cities and a long list of things architects should know

The death of desks, the truth about smart cities and a long list of things architects should know

by • Features

You can’t judge an international marketplace by wandering around an exhibition of its products for a day or two. This is a simple fact overlooked by a new piece in Dezeen which declares that desks are finished. This notion is based on a trip to the Orgatec furniture fair in Cologne. Our own review of the show will appear tomorrow, with the hysteria dialled down to a dull roar and with some added facts about what organisations actually buy most from office furniture companies (spoiler: desks and chairs) compared to what makes the sector more interesting.

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How landlords can maintain their mojo and retain tenants

How landlords can maintain their mojo and retain tenants

by • Facilities management, Features, Property

Flexibility is rocking the foundations of the traditional commercial real estate world. It’s entering our workforces, our offices and the shock waves are extending to the relationship between landlord and tenant. This demand for increased flexibility from the world’s workforces is due to a convergence of social and economic factors.  JLL’s Top 10 Global Corporate Real Estate (CRE) Trends report predicts the emergence of a more dynamic workforce, demand for work environments that support creativity, cross-collaboration and innovation, and an increasing focus on employee wellbeing and performance will dominate global CRE strategies throughout 2018. This has major implications for both occupiers and landlords.

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Law firms are finally embracing the agile workplace

Law firms are finally embracing the agile workplace

by • Comment, Workplace design

Strong office space take-up is predicted for this year after activity from law firms was down in 2017 against 10-year averages and compared to other sectors. Many legal companies are anticipating how their approach to workspace might have to change. This includes trialling new ways of working and years of overreliance on private offices. The legal sector is compared to many other services’ professions “closed” – and therefore ripe for change. There is an abundance of technology start-ups looking to introduce disruptive tech that will render many legal roles obsolete. The sector is also haemorrhaging senior talent as experienced professionals leave and the sector has failed thus far to adapt to modern working conventions including the agile workplace. Despite working in the digital age of wireless tech and cloud computing, 64 percent of lawyers found it difficult to work remotely because their technology wasn’t suitable (according to research from Lexis Nexis).

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