March 22, 2021

The era of work personalisation is upon us

by Gary Chandler • Comment, Workplace design

You may have heard it said that any idea repeated often enough develops some form of legitimacy. We’ve had plenty of reason to reflect on whether this notion is true or nor over the past year, especially as all-encompassing pronouncements about the future of work have proliferated and intensified. The problem is exacerbated by the fact that around 80 percent of people only read headlines. This can be a particular issue when you see a headline like The Death of the Office Desk is Upon Us above an article that suggests the death of the personal desk is upon us, when the reality is rather more about the personalisation of work. (more…)

February 5, 2021

Workplace things we have missed, and those we hope to regain

by Emma Morley • Comment, Technology, Wellbeing, Workplace design

Let’s be honest, work life pre 2020 had its flaws, whilst the longing for variety of scenery, change of pace and even a train journey (somewhere…ANYWHERE) would be welcomed by many of us right now, many of us had become a bit ‘hamster wheel’ in our approach. Commuting was stressful, expensive and time hungry; our natural and individual rhythms squeezed into a set 9-5 schedule and workplace design had become a bit ‘quantity over quality’ – desks have been reducing in size year upon year in order that capacity could be increased. We had reached a point at which everything was ripe for change but there was largely a resistance to both flexible working requests and embracing much of the technological advancements that were already at our fingertips. (more…)

January 26, 2021

Creating great workplace cultures

by Toby Benzecry • Features, Technology, Workplace design

Workplace design is – or should be – inextricably linked to both an organisation’s identity and its culture. The issue of workplace culture, and why it might succeed or fail, has become a matter of a great deal of study as the basis for work has moved on from the scientific management theories of the early to mid-20th Century. This aped the hierarchies, structures and forms of factories. It once prevailed but even now its vestiges remain, often in spite of the decades of research and a changing world of work that show us better ways of getting things done. (more…)

January 13, 2021

Workspace Show in London opens its doors for first time this year

by Freddie Steele • Company news, Workplace design

Workspace Show is an exciting addition to the global design events calendar, launching on 21 January this year, with the inaugural edition taking place from 4-5 November 2021 at London’s Business Design Centre, at the heart of the UK’s commercial interiors community. With a theme of ‘re-designing tomorrow’s commercial interiors together’ the show aims to unite architects, designers, developers, contractors, facilities managers, procurement managers and more in one place to explore and share the latest industry thinking from product launches to a comprehensive talks program to networking opportunities aplenty. (more…)

December 17, 2020

Organisations weigh up options to make workplace fit for the future

by Neil Franklin • News, Property

Avison Young, realestateworks and HLM Architects have launched a new report that assesses the impact of this year’s pandemic on workplace and corporate real estate strategies in the longer-term. Over 100 private and public sector companies were asked about their evolving approach to working culture, office design and portfolio strategies in the context of multiple forces of change, including greater resilience, the decarbonisation agenda, personalisation, remote working and the integration of the physical and virtual workspaces. (more…)

December 2, 2020

Creative firms have most to lose from a loss of serendipity

by Gary Chandler • Comment, Workplace design

Most of the analysis about the effects of the 2020 pandemic on people’s working lives has tended to involve grand statements about new normals and the death of this or that, as if everybody wants the same things, has the same personal circumstances, works in the same ways, the same places and same sectors. (more…)

November 18, 2020

The new era of elemental change for the workplace

by Neil Franklin • News

In the latest issue of IN Magazine, Chris Kane talks about his new book Where is My Office? and how this is possibly the best time to publish a book about workplace transformation, in spite of the upheavals of the last year. Another author and world-famous workplace expert to publish on a related theme is Neil Usher. His new book, Elemental Change, is also timely as many organisations look to a post-pandemic era in which they must challenge many of their previous assumptions about their structure and how, where and when they work. (more…)

November 17, 2020

Vitra to move London showroom from Clerkenwell to King`s Cross

by Neil Franklin • Company news, Workplace design

After 20 years in their Clerkenwell showroom, global design brand Vitra is set to move into a new space in Rolling Stock Yard, Kings Cross, which will open in January 2021. The temporary Kings Cross space will host a working installation looking at new office solutions for more flexible working. Vitra will open a new permanent UK flagship showroom in the Summer of 2021 and will announce the location in the coming months. The move comes as Vitra’s lease on its current Clerkenwell space draws to an end. (more…)

October 2, 2020

What (nearly) everybody gets wrong about work and the coronavirus

by Mark Eltringham • Comment, Flexible working, Workplace design

You’ve probably read and heard dozens, or even hundreds, of different viewpoints about the effect of the pandemic on the world of work. Most of them (until recently perhaps) have dished up one of the two binary options as part of a zero-sum game. Many are based on hackneyed ideas and expressed as clichés. (more…)

July 5, 2020

From the archive: the future of work and place in the 21st Century ⁰

by Mark Eltringham • Facilities management, Features, Flexible working, Technology, Workplace design

However much we know about the forces we expect to come into play in our time and however much we understand the various social, commercial, legislative, cultural and economic parameters we expect to direct them, most predictions of the future tend to come out as refractions or extrapolations of the present. This is a fact tacitly acknowledged by George Orwell’s title for Nineteen Eighty-Four, written in 1948, and is always the pinch of salt we can apply to science fiction and most of the predictions we come across. (more…)

June 18, 2020

Charles Handy was a true visionary about the modern workplace

by Mark Eltringham • Comment, Technology, Workplace

It’s incredibly hard not to be impressed by Charles Handy and even harder not to find him likeable. The scope of his intellect and humanity is evident on the page, in his interviews and in his broadcasts. He reeks of credibility and warmth. Do a Google image search of him and the pictures you find epitomise English middle-class academic decency (despite the fact that he’s Irish); jumpers, churchyards, armchairs and a benign smile. (more…)

May 17, 2020

About

by Mark Eltringham •

Insight Publishing is one of the world’s leading platforms for workplace news, commentary and features. It publishes podcasts, reports, daily updates and now IN and Works magazines.

Workplace Insight is the UK’s most widely read publication dedicated to the design and management of workplaces, offering a definitive source of daily ideas, comment, news and information. Launched in 2013, it publishes a weekly newsletter and has a readership of up to 8,000 unique users a day including workplace professionals, suppliers, purchasing, HR, IT and facilities managers and specifiers including fit-out firms, architects and designers.

IN Magazine was launched in 2020 to offer a new way of talking about the physical office and the digital and cultural aspects of work. Aimed at occupiers and managers, it is published every two months and has around 90,000 readers per issue. In the Spring of 2022, Works Magazine was launched aimed at Europe’s workplace interiors sector. It has quickly established itself as one of the continent’s essential reads for everybody interested in office design.

Insight Publishing is led by Mark Eltringham, a professional with over thirty years’ specialist experience working as an editor, writer and commentator. Mark is a Fellow of the Royal Society of the Arts and is the European Director of Work&Place Journal. Works magazine is edited and published by Mick Jordan, who has been a mainstay of the European office design scene for over twenty years. Insight Publishing employs an experienced and knowledgeable team of industry experts, journalists and professionals to offer you the most independent reporting of issues relating to workplace design, culture and management, property, cities and technology.

Philosophy

From day one, we have worked on the premise that modern ways of working are no longer about just physical offices, but about cultural and digital work spaces too. This is the driving force behind a new discipline that embraces existing professions like general management, facilities management, HR, IT, real estate, design and architecture. The end result is a coherent way of looking at a wide range of workplace issues centred on the needs of people that occupy the three domains of 21st Century work. We offer a platform for all those with new, insightful and meaningful things to say about related issues. We prefer not to follow received wisdom but produce thought-provoking, informative and occasionally challenging content.

Contact

Insight Publishing Ltd

Brampton House

10 Queen Street

Newcastle

Staffs ST5 0PS

England

E. enquiries@workplaceinsight.net