Search Results for: technology

March 30, 2018

Agile working driving structural change in New Zealand commercial property

by Mark Eltringham • Coworking, Flexible working, News, Property

Technological developments and agile working methodologies are driving significant, structural changes in the requirements for commercial property in New Zealand, according to new research from CBRE. One of these structural shifts is the rise in agile working, which has profound implications for the way office space is used. Unassigned seating is just one aspect of a truly agile business. Activity based working, third party space, coworking and flexibility around the way office space is used and leased are other real estate parts of a wider transformation into an agile organisation.

(more…)

March 30, 2018

Employers should not write off older female workers quite so readily

by Neil Franklin • News, Wellbeing, Workplace

An ageing population and changes to the default state pension age mean employers need to better prepare for the needs of older women in the workplace, according to a study by Anglia Ruskin University published by the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD). With more and more women aged between 50 and 65 now employed, the research reviewed published literature to look into the experience of those workers and how their needs might change in the future.

(more…)

March 29, 2018

UK Government shrinks size of its estate for eighth consecutive year

by Mark Eltringham • News, Property

The size of the UK government’s estate fell for the eight consecutive year in 2017, according to the annual State of the Estate report. The Cabinet Office’s report found that the government reduced its land holdings by more than 1m sq ft over the period 2016-2017, netting the government £620m in capital receipts and slashing running costs, which the Government claims is a direct consequence of its use of mobile technology and workplace design. The report outlines the property disposals in 2016/2017, which included the sale of its stake in the King’s Cross Central development and the 70-acre Sunningdale Park estate. The aim of the divestment programme is to generate £5bn in receipts and sell enough land for 160,000 homes by 2020. In the first two years of the Asset Efficiency programme, £1.66bn has now been raised in capital receipts from disposals, according to the report.

(more…)

March 28, 2018

Call for more internship opportunities to help employers close skills gap

by Sara Bean • News, Technology, Workplace

It should come as little surprise that graduates who have undertaken an internship are more likely to have honed the skills businesses needs, one of the main findings of the Institute of Student Employers (ISE) annual Development Survey, which launches today (28 March 2018) at the ISE Student Development Conference. The report found that 63 percent of employers believed graduates who had undertaken work experience had the required soft skills, yet less than half (48 percent) thought this of graduates in general. According to the report the five most common graduate skills gaps are; managing up (5 percent of employers believed graduates had this skill); dealing with conflict (12 percent); negotiating/influencing (17 percent); commercial awareness (23 percent and resilience (31 percent). This is why closing skills gaps is a priority for businesses with 74 percent of employers taking specific actions to tackle the issue in 2017. Changes to recruitment and on-the-job training were the most common actions and 16 percent of organisations improved their internship development programmes specifically to close skills gaps.

(more…)

March 26, 2018

Flexible working has a range of positive benefits for workers, a new report confirms

by Neil Franklin • Flexible working, News

Flexibility in where, when and how people work, including remote work, leads to an increase in innovation, as well as improvements in communication, creativity, productivity and engagement, according to a new study from the Flex+Strategy Group (FSG). This is among the key findings from a national probability telephone survey of 595 full-time employed US adults conducted for FSG by ORC International. The report claims that sixty percent of people who have flexible working options feel they’re “more productive and engaged.” Only 4 percent said they are less so, with 34 percent feeling their level of productivity and engagement is consistent. The results suggest major corporations including IBM may have gotten it wrong when they cited remote work as a barrier to innovation and collaboration and asked employees to re-locate back to company offices. The research also found a significant lack of training required for successful flexibility.

(more…)

March 23, 2018

Employees demand more, not less automation in the workplace

by Sara Bean • AI, Facilities management, News, Technology, Workplace

Over half (52 percent) of workers in a new poll have admitted looking for a new job because of frustrations over what they see as outdated ways of thinking around work practices and automation at their current company. The Digital Work Report 2018 commissioned by Wrike, surveyed just over 3,000 workers from across the UK, France and Germany, and highlighted a number of perceived benefits around automation, but its findings suggest that calls for greater adoption by employees are not being taken seriously. Nearly half of those surveyed (45 percent) in the UK believe automation would give their company a competitive advantage. However, while 39 percent are considering automation tools for some of their job functions, just 4 percent of UK companies have an automation strategy (i.e. planning to implement tools/techniques within next 12-24 months) for the whole company – considerably lower than European counterparts in Germany and France (both at 8 percent).

(more…)

March 21, 2018

Occupiers seeking tech, flexibility and wellness in a newly consumerised workplace

by Mark Eltringham • Flexible working, News, Property, Technology

Nearly two-thirds of corporate occupiers (62 percent) plan to increase their investment in real estate technology over the next three years, most of them in the next year, according to the 2018 EMEA Occupier Survey from CBRE. Companies are intending to invest more heavily in new real estate technologies over the short to medium term in order to enhance the user experience and raise workforce productivity. This represents a clear move away from aiming real estate technology at purely operational goals such as energy management.

(more…)

March 21, 2018

There are at least some reasons to be optimistic about the UK’s tech sector post Brexit

by Gary Chandler • Comment, Property, Technology, Workplace design

Making detailed predictions about the economic consequences of Brexit has proved a mug’s game many time over the past couple of years. The most accurate summation of what is happening might be ‘mixed’. Most recently, a report from the CBI has highlighted the resilience of many sectors while bemoaning a lack of skills in the economy. Meanwhile former Commercial Secretary to the Treasury Lord O’Neill also recently conceded that the UK economy had been more robust than he had expected following the Brexit vote, which he attributed primarily to the thriving world economy. An argument almost immediately dismissed by the economist Ruth Lea writing for the LSE, who put forward a more nuanced and mixed explanation. The same picture of tempered resilience is also evident in specific sectors, and especially those that were seen as the most likely to feel the consequences of the Brexit vote, including London’s crucial tech sector.

(more…)

March 20, 2018

Enter the MIPIM bandwagon, towed by pink elephants

by Anna King • Comment, Property, Technology

The old adage “once you spot a bandwagon, it’s probably too late to jump on” was certainly true at this year’s MIPIM if only for the increase in journalists sent by the national press (allegedly) hoping to catch a glimpse of men behaving badly and weaving tales of excess. Whilst the message of #TimesUp was heard loud and clear in the property world after the recent expose at the Presidents Club, the reality is the hedonistic opulence actually came to an end in 2009 after the global crash. That was the year that the property market realised they needed to do things differently and it was the beginning of putting people first. But it takes time for thoughts to turn to actions and reality, and a number of senior women that I spoke to observed that what we are now seeing are results of change and a drive to continue that change.

(more…)

March 19, 2018

Rigid cultures, lack of vision and poor tech are main barriers to workplace agility

by Neil Franklin • News, Technology

A new study commissioned by Ricoh Europe claims to reveal the factors that European business leaders believe are keeping them from achieving workplace agility. The list is topped by regulation (39 percent), lack of investment in new technologies (37 percent) and inescapably rigid internal hierarchies (35 percent) according to the 2,140 business leaders surveyed. These barriers limit what the report calls ‘the fluid, agile nature of a digitally empowered workplace that enables companies to quickly capitalise on changes in the market’.

(more…)

March 16, 2018

Recruitment via artificial intelligence must be monitored to avoid adopting human bias

by Sara Bean • AI, News, Technology, Workplace

Artificial intelligence systems need to be accountable for human bias at AI becomes more prevalent in recruitment and selection, attendees at the Employers Network for Equality & Inclusion’s annual conference have been warned. Hosted by NatWest, the conference, Diversity & Inclusion: The Changing Landscape heard from experts in ethics, psychology and computing. They explained that AIs learnt from existing data, and highlighted how information such as performance review scores and employee grading was being fed in to machines after being subjected to human unconscious bias. Dr David Snelling, the programme director for artificial intelligence at technology giant Fujitsu, illustrated how artificial intelligence is taught through human feedback. Describing how huge data sets were fed into the program, David explained that humans corrected the AI when it used that data to come to an incorrect conclusion, using this feedback to teach the AI to work correctly. However, as this feedback is subject to human error and bias, this can become embedded in the machine.

(more…)

March 16, 2018

Full fibre broadband could deliver £120bn boost to UK economy

by Neil Franklin • News, Technology

A new study conducted by economic consultancy Regeneris, and commissioned by Cityfibre, claims that the total economic impact of deploying full fibre ultrafast broadband networks across 100 UK city and towns, could reach £120bn over a 15 year period. The study examined ten areas of the UK economy likely to benefit from full fibre roll-outs. It also sought to quantify the impact of each of these areas in 100 distinct UK town and city economies over a 15-year period. According to the researchers, the UK’s business community – and most particularly its small and medium sized companies – could stand to benefit enormously. Access to full fibre could unlock £4.5bn in business productivity, innovation and access to new markets in these locations; a further £2.3bn in growth could be driven from catalysing new business start-ups; while the increased ability for companies to support flexible working could add £1.9bn.