The Cost of Fragmentation

Most organizations are not short on tools. Fifty percent are using an average of 17 standalone workplace technologies. What they lack is a unified solution that connects workflows, centralizes data and creates conditions for AI to do more than run chatbots or generate reports. Without that integration, strategic decision-making slows, resources are misallocated and real estate costs rise without clear return.

The path forward lies in building intelligent, connected workplaces: environments where embedded AI, cross-platform analytics and centralized digital infrastructure empower organizations to level out mid-week occupancy surges, extend the life cycle of physical assets and respond more effectively to shifting employee behaviors. In the race to become more agile, efficient and human-centered, the true advantage belongs to those who can unify people, place and asset data.

State of the workplace

The return to office is reshaping enterprise operations in measurable ways. Despite a broader acceptance of hybrid work, the midweek mountain trend persists: employee presence peaks on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays, creating bottlenecks midweek while office spaces remain underutilized at the beginning and end of the week.

This uneven occupancy creates pressure on real estate planning. Facilities leaders are tasked with balancing unpredictable demand against long-term real estate costs, rethinking traditional assumptions about space needs. The challenge extends beyond simply providing enough desks — it requires creating dynamic, adaptable environments that can flex with fluctuating attendance patterns, while still supporting collaboration, productivity and a positive employee experience.

At the same time, a generational shift is accelerating new expectations. With Gen Z now making up 18 percent of the global workforce, the demand for digital-first, seamless experiences is reshaping workplace strategies. These digital natives expect intuitive tools, frictionless workflows and environments that mirror the fluid, connected experiences they encounter outside of the workplace. As a result, organizations must not only optimize their physical spaces but also ensure their digital infrastructure can support new ways of working or risk falling behind in the competition for talent.

Challenges facing operational leaders

While workplace expectations have evolved, the tools used to manage them often have not kept pace. Most organizations are navigating an increasingly complex digital environment — one marked not by a lack of technology, but by its fragmentation. Companies are using workplace technologies ranging from employee scheduling tools and visitor management systems to asset management platforms and real estate dashboards. In many cases, these tools operate in isolation, without shared data infrastructure or common workflows.

Only 4 percent of organizations report having fully integrated systems, leaving the vast majority grappling with disjointed user experiences and limited visibility across their operations.

This fragmented ecosystem imposes a measurable operational burden. With data siloed across platforms, the effort required to generate meaningful insights becomes unsustainable. More than a third of businesses rely on 11 or more full-time employees to collate, analyze and report on their workplace data — a stark indicator of how much manual effort is still required in an era that is ostensibly defined by automation.

At the root of the issue is a lack of interoperability. Operational leaders cite the proliferation of dashboards and disconnected data streams as the key barrier to analyzing their workplace performance, with 55 percent pointing to the length of time it takes to extract meaningful insights from across different sources.

These conditions also limit the effectiveness of AI. While most organizations have begun exploring AI-enabled tools, usage remains largely superficial. Chatbots, dashboards and diagnostics represent the most common applications today — helpful, but far from transformational. Fifty-eight percent of respondents indicated that insufficient internal AI skillsets are holding them back from AI adoption; and 52 percent say they struggle with cross-platform integration, making it difficult for them to unlock more advanced, value-generating capabilities such as predictive maintenance, scenario modeling or real-time automation. Without foundational integration and clean, consolidated data, AI cannot deliver its full potential, and operational leaders cannot move beyond reactive problem-solving.

Strategic opportunities by business function

Despite the hurdles of fragmented systems and the untapped potential of AI, significant opportunities are emerging, especially for leaders willing to rethink traditional silos and apply integrated strategies tailored to key operational goals.

• Employee experience

  For those focused on employee experience, the priority is clear: leveling occupancy across the work week to create a more balanced, efficient use of space. By smoothing out midweek congestion and encouraging more consistent attendance across all five days, organizations can optimize collaboration, improve resource planning and enhance the day-to-day employee experience. Achieving this requires more than updated work policies; it demands integrated digital tools that provide employees with real-time visibility into office density, team presence and workspace availability, enabling individuals to make informed choices about when and where they work.

  Of equal importance is aligning a unified vision for the future workplace. Rather than layering new solutions onto outdated models, leading organizations are prioritizing seamless, frictionless digital experiences that align with the expectations of a digital-native workforce. Platforms that connect booking, collaboration and amenities into a single interface not only improve user satisfaction but also generate the level of data needed for continuous workplace optimization.

• Buildings & facilities

  Facility and real estate management teams are navigating through a period of heightened uncertainty. Traditional models based on stable, predictable occupancy are no longer applicable. The opportunity now lies in optimizing real estate portfolios through flexible, data-driven strategies. Leaders are leveraging dynamic occupancy analytics to recalibrate their space needs, identify opportunities to consolidate or repurpose underutilized properties, and align real estate investments with actual patterns of use.

  Automation is another critical enabler. FM leaders are turning to AI to streamline processes that they once managed manually. For example, 68 percent of organizations said they plan to implement AI in visitor management within the next 12 months, using automated check-ins, facial recognition and security integrations to enhance both safety and efficiency. Sustainability is also an area of focus, with integrated building systems offering new pathways for leaders to reduce their energy use, improve indoor environmental quality and meet corporate ESG commitments.

• Asset management

  Asset managers have a strategic imperative to extend asset life cycles, minimize operational risks and control maintenance costs.

  With aging portfolios and rising capital expenditures, simply reacting to asset failures is no longer a viable approach. Instead, digital inventories combined with predictive analytics enable preventive maintenance, life cycle forecasting and smarter asset allocation.

  Digitalization offers a clear path to better outcomes for asset management. Centralized, real-time asset inventories give organizations a more granular understanding of asset condition, usage patterns and performance history. Predictive maintenance models, powered by cross-platform data analytics, can help identify failure risks before they occur, dramatically reducing downtime and repair costs. As these capabilities mature, asset management will continue shifting from a cost center to a critical lever for value creation.

Unlocking the intelligent worktech value chain

Behind every successful workplace transformation is a shift from fragmented tools and processes to a unified value chain — one where systems become more cohesive, data drives decisions and AI augments human capabilities. Operational maturity is not just about acquiring better software solutions; it is becoming more connected, more informed and more intelligent in how an organization operates.

Integration enables organizations to eliminate redundant tools, unify workflows and surface insights that would remain hidden in siloed systems. Centralized data — no longer scattered across multiple dashboards — empowers leaders to act faster and with greater clarity. AI, added to integrated systems and unified data, has the power to move organizations from reactive to predictive.

In asset management, for example, preventive maintenance takes significantly less time and labor than reactive fixes — 1 hour and 17 minutes versus 2 hours and 22 minutes, on average — and AI can be used to forecast when interventions are needed even before failures occur. These capabilities are real, measurable and increasingly necessary; but fully capturing their value requires breaking down barriers to integration and AI adoption and building a stronger business case for transformation. The future of workplace operations lies in being more connected, more informed and more intelligent. As enterprises face mounting pressures to increase productivity, reduce spend and enhance the human experience of the workplace, the value of taking a unified approach across the business is undeniable. Integration is not simply a technological upgrade — it is a strategic imperative that enables AI to drive insights, automate routine tasks and guide smarter decisions.

It is clear that the path forward requires dismantling data silos, modernizing legacy processes and adopting a connected approach that reflects the dynamic needs of today’s workforce. By embracing this evolution with purpose and clarity, organizations will be well positioned to thrive in a landscape defined by rapid change and heightened expectations.