Generally speaking, FMs are directly responsible for day-to-day user interactions with the built environments they oversee, while real estate directors are charged with delivering on the value those built spaces represent. These distinct roles and viewpoints overlap most notably in the consideration of user experience (UX), the former working to optimize day-to-day end-user interactions while the latter group focuses on the complete portfolio and how the full range of experiences contribute to the calculation of value.

For both, there is an understanding that UX directly impacts the portfolio, and that value is what matters – to shareholders in the corporate context or to trustees in institutional settings like higher education. While calculation formulas may vary, per-square-foot metrics are typically improved when occupants use a space more often or report greater satisfaction when surveyed.

A primary goal for renovations and capital improvements must then be to positively impact the experience of a facility’s users. Strategies for determining and prioritizing improvements should be weighted, typically toward the preferences of those who interact with the built space most frequently – usually employees or students – though the experiences of less frequent users may also pertain, especially those whose impression of the organization may be vital.

The importance of organizational culture

A review of trade journals, studies and literature reveals that within the last five to 10 years, UX has become an overarching concern for both FM and real estate management in the corporate world. Research into workplace end-user experience by Kwon, Remøy and Van Den Dobbelsteen – published last year in Property Management – outlines 10 main factors to increase user satisfaction in office renovation, each associated in some way with satisfaction and comfort: thermal comfort, air quality, lighting, noise, user control, privacy, concentration, communication, social contact and spatial comfort. In their findings, the authors then categorized these influential factors into three levels of comfort, the highest priority being physical, followed by functional and psychological, in that order.

The research is enormously helpful in organizing one’s thinking regarding improvement strategy, but it is intended specifically to provide guidance for balancing energy-efficiency improvements with user satisfaction. In the end, each organization has its own unique culture and workflow, and its own priorities. While FMs strive to optimize operational cost and sustainability, not every corporation may be prioritizing energy efficiency when addressing its real estate and building assets.

Some FMs may consider strategic realignment across their portfolio to be the foremost concern, identifying ways to make more efficient use of floor area, improve workflow and organization, and plan to meet future changes or expansion requirements. Others, especially in the light of the COVID-19 crisis, focus on aspects of resiliency or on reducing the scale of the overall workplace footprint as certain kinds of work are performed remotely more often.

To avoid the pitfalls of buzzwords, conflicting trends and one-size-fits-all solutions, organizations should engage in a thorough visioning process that involves as many employees and other stakeholders as possible. Typically led by experienced professionals (e.g., design firms or workplace strategy consultants), visioning may include workshops or surveys, or a combination of these and other methods of collecting data and input. The goal is to develop a clear picture of the organizational culture – the user culture – to shape decision making for improvement priorities.

Other company cultures will also value well-being, productivity and comfort, but some may find that wages, benefits, flexibility, environmental sustainability or other examples are prized more highly by users. At institutional organizations, users such as students may have other priorities like accessibility or social responsibility. In all cases, visioning creates a path for responsive renovations that will positively impact UX.

The complete UX

Corporations competing for talented recruits while retaining valued employees tend to emphasize UX to the point that their view expands well beyond the workplace boundaries, thinking of it like a three-act play. In this rough analogy, Act One is the commute, followed by the arrival and lobby, and finally the office work environment itself.

To include the commute as part of UX may seem peculiar in this context, but there are several ways in which the facility can (and perhaps should) affect the user’s commute and other off-property hours depending on the company culture. One example is the employer-provided van or bus that transports persons from a transit station or parking garage to and from the facility entrance. This service can be very meaningful for the user, providing space to mentally prepare in those last few minutes before the working day starts, without worrying about whether you have your umbrella. In this sense, transportation may be experienced by the user as a temporary haven. This contribution to health and well-being – before the employee (or student) even reaches the front door – can have a measurable impact on productivity, as well as on the user’s perception of the organization.

Alternatively, consider the example of a Fortune 500 company prioritizing flexibility. One such company, a global professional services firm, recently completed a major new regional hub at an office campus in Texas. Investment in proprietary mobile apps and cloud-based technologies provides employees at home or on the move with the ability to reserve workstation space and meeting rooms for chunks of time, eliminating the need to make such arrangements while tethered to a computer. Importantly, a constant feedback loop function integrated into the app allows the FM and consultants to make recommendations regarding improvements based on data directly related to user experience.

Technology upgrades of this kind are also achievable for smaller firms. Arrival and the lobby

Many organizations will invest in making a strong positive impression on visiting benefactors and clients, whether it actually views them as “users” in this context. The entrance area and lobby represent significant opportunities in this regard. Aspects of organizational culture revealed during visioning can be translated by experienced design teams appropriately and cost-effectively into a tailored arrival experience, positively impacting both the daily user and the high-value visitor.

For the employee, student or other regular user, the lobby sets the tone for the day. Executive leadership can work with the FM team, architects and designers to craft an experience that conveys the organization’s mission and core principles in ways that can inspire the user, with choices of materials, environmental graphics, original artwork (perhaps user-created) and brand-inspired elements. Depending on space and infrastructure, the lobby can also provide services and amenities – varied seating, food service, Wi-Fi connectivity, device charging stations and so forth – creating a socially and commercially activated space that has its own life. The lobby becomes its own experience and a way to reinforce among regular users a sense of shared purpose and mission.

Recognizing that few users will spend much time in the lobby, the goal is to find ways to engage the stakeholders and offer a glimpse into the organization’s identity – to let the user in, to feel like they are a contributor, as part of the experience rather than just an observer.

Renovation and improvement projects for the lobby should emerge from the results of the visioning process, to be translated into cost-effective, impactful design choices that are unique to the organization’s mission and culture. For the workplace described earlier, the choice was made to create an impressive sky lobby: visitors and employees take elevators up from the entrance to reception, which is adjacent to a combined cafeteria and event space filled with natural daylight – offering visitors an instant glimpse of the corporate culture and connecting employees immediately upon arrival to a familiar, welcoming space.

Now consider a very different lobby renovation scenario on an institutional campus. New students looking for assistance from the orientation office previously had to make their way from the entrance through a lengthy series of hallways, past a conference room, to reach their destination. Architects worked with the university FM team to swap the locations of the office and conference room, while updating both and refreshing with finishes inspired by the university branding. This had the effect of improving the UX of staffers and the students they serve, by connecting them visually and immediately upon entering. At the same time, users of the updated conference room now enjoy added privacy and upgrades to audiovisual technology for their meetings.

Work & study environments

The third act of the UX play impacts the regular user the most, because it includes the locations where they spend the most time. Depending on the organization, these will be offices, meeting rooms, study rooms, and associated spaces and amenities. Time spent in available spaces will vary, so UX surveys and studies can be helpful to determine priorities for renovations, especially when combined with building management system data, if available.

There have been extraordinary circumstances in the world, since the earliest responses to the COVID-19 pandemic. While it is too early to say whether social distancing is now a permanent cultural fixture, the fact remains that the adjustment has taught each organization just how resilient their workflow or pedagogy is when subject to physical separation and home isolation. In one company, a recent employee survey revealed that two of every five employees believe that their productivity was unchanged – and another one in every three reported that productivity had increased – while working from home.

User surveys at will likely reveal a wide range of feelings, preferences and outcomes, but it may be that working and studying from home is here to stay, at least in combination with more familiar modes. Again, engaging with a broad spectrum of stakeholders in a visioning process is recommended, because one organizational culture will view the future differently from others. Once clear goals and priorities are established, the task remains as before: create improvements that enhance UX, which in turn should boost the value of assets.

The organization’s leadership may decide to restructure its office plan, introduce or enhance amenities, upgrade existing infrastructure, realign to create new synergies or introduce brand-inspired elements to reinforce the culture. They may elect to engage in a pilot program for one facility and consider the results before applying the program to other assets in the portfolio – a highly successful strategy for a range of improvement types, when carefully coordinated with experienced design consultants.

Ultimately, the FM team and their collaborators should be focused on delivering value to the organization, and to do so they must fully understand the user base. Satisfied users will always be reflected, visibly and measurably, in the portfolio value.