To attract talent, unleash the potential of their people and build sustainable business models in a fast-changing marketplace, organizations are under pressure to continuously improve and innovate.

In his famous Theory of Human Motivation (1943), psychologist Abraham Maslow revealed an approach to eliciting peak performance, at both an individual and organizational level. He described how humans can focus on just one level of need at any given time. First, basic needs must be taken care of, such as food, water, warmth, rest and safety. Then the focus switches to psychological needs, such as relationships and feelings of accomplishment. Once these psychological needs are met, people can focus on self-actualization: achieving their potential.

Applying Maslow’s pyramid to the workplace, FM focus has moved beyond the satisfaction of basic needs like lighting, HVAC and security, toward supporting high-level corporate objectives around innovation, collaboration and productivity.

Agile working: The new normal

To achieve these corporate objectives and meet the rising expectations of all stakeholders — from CEOs, suppliers and partners, to customers and workers — agile working arrangements are fast becoming the new normal.

Many organizations are implementing hot-desking as a first step, optimizing the ratio of employees to desks, to reduce their real estate costs and carbon footprint.

According to IWG’s Global Workplace Survey, 62 percent of businesses worldwide have a flexible workspace policy and 67 percent of business leaders believe flexibility can improve productivity by at least 20 percent.

The survey also found that 80 percent of people, when faced with two similar employment offers, would turn down the one that didn’t offer flexible working. As the war for talent rages, organizations are striving to embrace new working practices that offer greater choice in when, where and how work gets done, particularly when it comes to attracting and developing top talent.

According to psychology researchers Frank L. Schmidt and Michael K. Judiesch, an employee in the top 1 percent of performers in terms of productivity, is worth 12 of those in the bottom 1 percent; and for high-complexity jobs, the differential is so large that it cannot be quantified.

“Go after the cream of the cream. A small team of A+ players can run circles around a giant team of B and C players.”

– Steve Jobs

Evidence is mounting that these talented workers expect greater autonomy and a slicker workplace experience than ever before. FMs have a fundamental role to play in creating these conditions from which peak performance emerges. This is made possible by adopting new processes and tools, including predictive analytics driven by machine learning, smart space utilization platforms and consumer-grade mobile functionality.

Beyond flexibility: Autonomy is key to improved productivity

In 2020 onward, more organizations will leverage these technologies to shift beyond flexible and work-from-home options, to offer a work anywhere environment. This focus on employee choice is critical. In addition to providing a superior employee experience that strengthens their employer brand, it helps organizations achieve corporate objectives around profit, sustainability, innovation, well-being and productivity.

Yet not all workers will choose to fly off to the Bahamas and work from the beach —and even those who do, may not want to do it all the time. Many value the office as a place where they can do their best work, build relationships and learn from others. Ultimately, some people prefer to work from the office, some prefer to work elsewhere and others choose to strike a balance, popping in and out when it suits them.

Researchers at Stanford University conducted a two-year study at China’s largest travel agency that revealed a dramatic 22 percent increase in productivity from telecommuting, equivalent to a full day’s work each week, while employee attrition went down by 50 percent. At the same time, less travel resulted in a lower carbon footprint and a reduction in headquarter office space that saved almost $2,000 per employee.

Interestingly, when workers were given a choice about where they wanted to work, performance gains were twice as high as when they were told to work from the office or from home.

The positive correlation between worker autonomy and productivity was also revealed by researchers at Harvard Business School when they studied the impact of implementing liberal work from anywhere arrangements at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. Productivity increased by 4.4 percent versus traditional work-from-home policies, while revenue increased, office costs were slashed and hiring costs were reduced Improved productivity meant fewer new hires were needed to complete the work. Workers boosted their earning power by moving to less expensive regions, and at the same time, decreased carbon emissions through fewer office commutes.

A new era of choice

The workplace of the future is all about choice, a place where autonomous workers choose to be, when it suits them.

Since the modern workplace is competing with alternative workspaces, FMs must provide a stimulating and fit-for-purpose experience in the office that enables people to work productively, collaborate effectively, build relationships and learn new skills — in short, give them an outstanding experience that they can’t get elsewhere.

A popular strategy in 2020 and beyond is activity-based working (ABW), a subset of agile working which provides people with a choice of workspaces designed for a specific type of activity, e.g. comfortable bean-bag areas for discussions, huddle rooms, collaborative spaces with interactive whiteboards, or pods for quiet concentration.

According to a report by Kinnarps, almost 70 percent of employees say working in an ABW environment gives them more energy, helps them achieve better results and is more stimulating.

British utilities company National Grid certainly found this to be the case when they achieved an 8 percent increase in overall productivity and a reduction in operating costs of £8-10 million per year as a result of implementing ABW.

Smart space utilization tools

To minimize costs and optimize the workplace environment for different types of work, such as brainstorming or focused research, FMs must arm themselves with accurate, real-time data on space utilization.

Assessing which spaces are being over-used or under-used forms the foundation of an action plan, while giving facilities managers a way to measure what is and is not working. Correlating this usage data with wider datasets, such as productivity and employee engagement data, further enriches the picture, informing decisions around whether to create more an open plan or private spaces, introduce booths, or shift the office cafe to a different location, among other possibilities.

It is a common assumption that open office plans improve collaboration. Yet when Harvard researchers Ethan Bernstein and Stephen Turban studied two corporate headquarters transitioning to more open office spaces, they found that the volume of face-to-face interaction decreased by 70 percent, while digital dialogue increased.

What works in one organization or team does not always translate to another. By using analytics, FMs can adopt an agile, lean, experimental approach to designing the environment that best meets their needs — while testing, learning and improving their workplace strategies based on reality, not assumptions.

Eliminating waste

Along with measuring utilization, FMs are using smart space utilization tools to reduce wasted space and energy, by eliminating no-shows: room and desk bookings that people fail to show up for. A report by Unwired and Plow Consulting found 30 percent of meeting space is typically wasted due to no-shows. Collaboration and productivity suffer as a result, because spaces that appear fully booked cannot be used by those who need them, including spontaneous, unscheduled meetings. There is also the hidden cost of carrying space that is not fully utilized.

Strategic seating

FMs can also boost productivity using space utilization data by experimenting with seating arrangements.

Researchers at Harvard Business School and Cornerstone OnDemand found workers’ performance at a large tech company was influenced by whom they sat next to, and that rearranging seating increased organizational performance by 15 percent, adding US$1 million annual profit to its bottom line.

Similarly, a study of a Korean e-commerce company found that when employees responsible for striking deals with suppliers sat next to new people, they landed 25 percent more deals.

FMs can use strategic seating techniques to create opportunities for collaboration and employee connectivity — or planned serendipity, just as Steve Jobs did through workplace design. Jobs purposely made sure that the large central bathrooms in Pixar’s headquarters were positioned in the atrium, so most people had to take a long walk to use the facilities. He understood that this increased the likelihood that people would bump into one another, sparking spontaneous conversations.

Consumer-grade mobile apps

Making it easy to book spaces and other resources, such as parking, AV equipment and catering — all through mobile devices — helps organizations create a seamless employee journey, while optimizing the ratio of employees to desks to reduce real estate costs and the carbon footprint.

Advanced, user-friendly mobile technology will enable a robust, convenient experience for workers — that rivals consumer apps — from any device. Ease of use is essential, as a study by ArcTouch revealed only 12 percent of office workers use enterprise mobile apps, despite the ubiquity of mobile devices in the workplace. The lack of use resulted from poor user experience.

However, it doesn’t have to be that way. Employees in agile working environments can use an intuitive app on their mobile device to tailor their experience, creating the right office set-up (including adjusting lighting and heating) for the type of work they need to do that day. Using data visualization technology, with smart space utilization data, employees can view a heatmap of the office, showing the most (or least) popular rooms and desks, so they can make better-informed decisions about what to book. Those working in a new office can view the office layout in advance and be directed to where their colleagues are sitting.

This kind of functionality supports an agile, activity-based way of working, while enhancing employee well-being and performance.

When mobile apps, space utilization tools and predictive analytics connect, employee experience can be taken to a whole new level. Studies from Craig Knight and Alexander Haslam at the University of Exeter showed that designing and customizing your own workspace improves health, happiness and productivity.

The Edge in Amsterdam, dubbed the smartest building in the world, enables this kind of customization, even changing the lighting and temperature based on a worker’s known preferences.

AI & predictive analytics

Predictive analytics has the potential to radically improve operations. While in use in a variety of fields, machine learning is not yet being widely applied in FM.

The future possibilities are exciting. By taking a large amount of data and using it to predict possible scenarios, machine learning could equip FMs with the insights they need to improve decision-making.

Data collected from sensors, for instance, can be used to project lighting, heating and energy usage. Based on business projections, hiring needs and current space utilization, predictive analytics could also anticipate changing space and real estate requirements, helping FMs stay a step ahead in providing the optimal workplace environment.

In 2018, Google revealed they handed over control of cooling several of their data centers to an AI algorithm. During two years of testing, the algorithm learned how to adjust fans, ventilation and other cooling equipment, providing data center managers with recommendations to reduce power consumption. This resulted in energy savings of around 40 percent and gave Google sufficient confidence in the algorithm to put AI in control.

The Edge in Amsterdam has deployed 30,000 sensors to collect building operations data, as well as data on occupant interactions. As a result, various applications can direct people to parking spaces as well as close down sections of the building with low occupancy, to save energy.

According to UN estimates, real state accounts for about 40 percent of the world’s energy consumption and a third of all carbon emissions. Sustainable practices are not only vital for the environment, but also provide key costs savings and represent brand values that are important to employees, customers and other stakeholders.

Machine-learning-driven FM software will not only aid human decision-making to improve sustainability, financial performance and employee experience, it will also enable organizations to make some decisions without human intervention by anticipating and solving problems that humans may not have thought of.

Conclusion

Converging workforce trends and technologies are fundamentally changing the definition of work and the workplace. The workplace of the future is smart, sustainable, efficient, collaborative, agile and innovative. And, for employees, it needs to be an environment that supports autonomy and choice.

FMs are collaborating with executives in other areas, including HR and IT, to lead the way in creating environments in which creativity thrives, well-being soars and results flow in.

Given that people typically account for 90 percent of operating costs, anything that impacts their productivity has a disproportionately huge impact on top corporate objectives. This equation lies at the heart of the business case for adopting new technologies and workplace strategies in 2020 and beyond.

To rise to this challenge, facility managers are widening the depth and breadth of their responsibilities and toolkit, becoming more strategic and leveraging technologies like smart space utilization, mobile and predictive analytics to influence performance and the ability for employees to reach their full potential.