Search Results for: technology

January 10, 2019

Essay collection challenges the cliches about the future of work

by Mark Eltringham • AI, News, Technology

The RSA Future Work Centre has published a new essay collection which it claims presents fresh perspectives on the future of work. The report claims that there are four basic problems with the mainstream narrative about work: that there is a fixation with certain technologies, especially artificial intelligence and robotics; that this in turn leads to a distorted perception of the effects of technology; that this analysis ignores reality in favour of potential; and that technological change does not take place in a vacuum and has a number of knock-on effects that aren’t always considered. Worth noting that the authors of the essays are predominantly academic and the report focuses almost exclusively on the effects of technology.

January 9, 2019

Digital transformation and an uncharted future for workplace design in 2019

by Cherie Johnson and Julie Yonehara • Comment, Technology, Workplace design

In some way, humans have touched every single thing on this planet. We’re stepping into unknown territory. We’re changing everything. Think about that. Now, think about digital transformation. New technologies are changing how we interact with our environment, how we work, how we play and how we live. Tech tools are being more readily adopted as they get better and more accessible and, as a result our attitudes about them are changing. These are big ideas. And, they are rapidly changing our work and the domain of workplace design around the world. More →

January 9, 2019

Podcast: embracing the punk spirit and the elemental workplace

by Mike Petrusky • Facilities management, Features, Workplace design

Neil Usher is an experienced senior property, workplace, facilities and change management leader who is currently an executive consultant for Unispace and workessence. He is also the author of “The Elemental Workplace” in which he describes “the 12 elements for creating a fantastic workplace for everyone”. In this new podcast, I ask Neil about the latest trends in the workplace and finds out his opinions on the open office debate, the impact of technology, and the importance of workplace experience. Neil argues that workplace is now being taken seriously as a contributor to performance and is a significant part of our organization’s culture, so we must establish “laws of workplace” that we can use as a foundation to build on in our practice. We discuss the origins of the punk rock music scene and agree that we must bring “the spirit of punk” to our work by being fearless about trying new things in our roles as workplace leaders.

January 8, 2019

From nudge tech to listening tools, Gartner makes some workplace predictions for 2019

by Brian Kropp • AI, Comment, Technology, Workplace

Last year we saw businesses reporting their gender pay gap, General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) taking effect, speculation on how Brexit will impact jobs and further impact on how technology is changing the way we work. Looking forward to the year ahead, Gartner has pulled together a fresh set of workplace predictions for the coming year. This includes the demise of employee surveys as the adoption of sophisticated listening tools accelerates; precious little progress in closing the gender pay gap, but the evolution of discrepancies in pay scales between new hires and existing employees; the rise and rise of the #MeToo movement, which could lead to more senior executives being ousted in 2019 than in 2018; and new technologies designed to nudge workers into action.

January 8, 2019

Record take up in Northern Ireland office market amid concerns over future investment

by Sara Bean • Cities, Facilities management, News, Property

The Northern Ireland office market had a record year in 2018, with a 100 percent increase in take-up, according to the latest figures from CBRE. The Northern Ireland (NI) office sector enjoyed its most successful year on record with 885,023 sq ft of take-up reported across 84 transactions, more than double that achieved last year. Notable office deals completed in 2018 included the PwC move to Merchant Square, Northern Ireland Civil Service at 9 Lanyon Place, Allstate at Mays Meadow, TLT at River House and Baker McKenzie at City Quays 2, which is part of Belfast’s City Quays mixed-use regeneration project. However, according to CBRE’s Real Estate Outlook report, the office market in NI is hampered by a severe lack of investment deals in the face of ongoing local, national and international political uncertainty. This means that while the real estate market in Northern Ireland generally has performed well in 2018, the investment sector experienced a decrease in activity as a resulting knock-on effect of the current political situation locally at Stormont as well as ongoing Brexit negotiations.

January 7, 2019

World Bank report calls for changing approach to working cultures

by Neil Franklin • News, Workplace

A new report from the World Bank has call for more investment in people to prepare them for the economies of the future. The 2019 World Development report (WDR) “The Changing Nature of Work” claims that digital technologies are driving the demand for advanced cognitive skills, socio-behavioral skills, and adaptability in labour markets. The digital economy also presents an opportunity to create more jobs.

January 7, 2019

Workers say finding people with the right skills is biggest issue this year

by Sara Bean • News, Workplace

Over half of workers (53 percent) believe that getting the right people with the right skills will be the biggest issue faced by their workplace in the year ahead. This is according to research published by Acas today, which commissioned YouGov to find out what UK employees identified as the most important workplace issues in the year ahead. The other two top issues identified were technological change (36 percent) and productivity (36 percent). Other issues identified by participants in the poll included fit and healthy staff (18 percent) and Equality and Fairness (17 percent). Acas Chief Exec, Susan Clews, said: “Employees feel that getting workers with the right skills is a key concern in the year ahead. This could be attributed to uncertainty around our relationship with the EU at the moment or general concerns around skills shortages.

December 21, 2018

Are open plan workspaces truly evil or is this just fake news?

by Dr Caroline M. Burns • Features, Workplace design

A recently published paper describing the results of an academic study by Ethan S. Bernstein and Stephen Turban[1], both of Harvard, has become another unwarranted casualty of the debate within our industry and in the mainstream media on ‘open plan’ offices versus anything else. The researchers conducted two controlled studies in different organisations before and after a workplace refurbishment from dedicated cubicles to dedicated open plan (benching) neighbourhoods, and concluded that face to face interaction reduced significantly, while email and other digital communications increased in the new environment.

December 17, 2018

Don’t be a turkey, get on the commercial property gravy train

by Jo Sutherland • Comment, Property

Last week, the RICS Commercial Property conference tackled the biggest issues impacting the built environment sector, arming delegates with fragments of the formula for future success. The morning CEO Question Time panel put a trio of CEOs in the spotlight. In addition to airing concerns about the current political climate, rapidly shifting societal attitudes, diversity and inclusion, the ageing population coupled with the ongoing housing shortage, climate change and the complexities involved in exploring new business models to drive and diversify revenue, they all zoomed in on the accelerated pace of change we’re witnessing, crowning it the key challenge for today’s C-suite.

December 17, 2018

More than half of employees have experienced some form of workplace bullying

by Neil Franklin • Wellbeing, Workplace

More than half (52 percent) of employees in global organisations have encountered workplace bullying and felt psychologically unsafe at work, according to a new study conducted by City & Guilds Group. The report also claims that only one in ten firms proactively take steps to support staff mental health, and found a major discrepancy in how senior management and employees view psychological safety in the workplace. Almost all of respondents surveyed (94 percent) said that they consider psychological safety to be “important”, but just 10 percent of businesses are seen to treat it as a priority. In part this seems down to confusion over accountability; almost half (43 percent) of senior management expect HR to deal with the psychological safety of employees at work, while the majority of employees (56 percent), believe line managers and senior management should take the lead.

December 13, 2018

Flexible working should not mean employers ask people to work all the time

by Oliver Shaw • Comment, Flexible working, Wellbeing

Talking about the role of technology within the flexible working arena is hardly ground-breaking. For decades, technological advancements have been hailed as pivotal to developments within the employment landscape. But this year, conversation appears to have reached another level. In an article for Open Access Government in June 2018, for instance, Richard Morris, UK CEO of International Workplace Group (IWG), explained the extent to which technology-driven shifts have caused significant social change. And in September, HR headlines homed in on a study by Capita and Citrix, which stressed that an inability to quickly introduce new IT services is restricting organisations’ flexibility proposition, and consequently their competitiveness.

December 12, 2018

People are great: a conversation with James Woudhuysen on the future of work ⁰

by Mark Eltringham • Features, Podcasts, Technology, Workplace design

At a conference at the WWF’s Living Planet Centre in Woking staged by the office furniture firm Kinnarps, I had an off the cuff chat with James Woudhuysen who had just delivered one of his typically entertaining, erudite and challenging talks on the future of work alongside equally renowned speakers such as Philip Tidd and Namrata Krishna from architecture firm Gensler. James is an academic, writer, commentator and (dread word) futurologist. More →