Has Covid-19 spelled the end of the office?
Working from home looks as if it is here to stay, and open-plan offices may be a thing of the unproductive past. Katie Kenny reports on the future of work.
It has taken a global pandemic to shake up outdated office spaces, but flexible and remote working is here to stay, says Lizzi Whaley, chief executive of Auckland design and fitout company Spaceworks.
‘‘Everyone has issues with open-plan working, and we’ve been trying to solve them for years.’’
When faced with the prospect of allowing employees to work from home or have no revenue coming in, many businesses suddenly adapted.
Now’s the time to build on those changes and how they’ll apply long-term, Whaley says. And those who don’t seize the opportunity will be left behind.
Whaley and her colleagues were among 727,000-odd whitecollar workers able to operate from home during New Zealand’s lockdown period, in an attempt to curb the spread of Covid-19. That’s around 29 per cent of the national workforce, according to analysis from Infometrics.
At 11.59pm on Wednesday, May 13, New Zealand moved from Covid-19 alert level 3 to level 2 – meaning the disease is contained but the risk of community transmission remains. The reduced alert level meant businesses were able to open, provided they comply with public health guidance on physical distancing and contact tracing.
Before and during the lockdown, companies updated their systems to allow for remote working, and many plan to continue with some version of it post-Covid-19.
But even before the pandemic struck, remote work was gaining traction among white-collar workers. In fact, since the invention of the personal computer, people have been predicting the death of offices.
A survey of working life, conducted between October and December 2018, found over half of New Zealanders had flexible working hours and one-third had worked from home.
Flexibility meant being able to vary the hours, days and location of work. The types of flexibility people had depended on their industry and job.
In the 2018 survey, men were more likely to have flexible hours (54 per cent compared with 49 per cent for women) and parents of dependent children were more likely to have flexible hours than non-parents (57 per cent versus 49 per cent). The employees with the most flexibility were in rental, hiring, and real estate services. Those with the least were in healthcare and social assistance.
The survey also found 33 per cent of men and 35 per cent of women had at some stage worked from home. Again, parents were more likely to have worked from home (44 per cent) than non-parents (29 per cent).
However, even when employees had permission to leave early to pick up their children from school, for example, they felt uncomfortable ‘‘leaving loudly’’, according to research funded by Westpac and conducted by Colmar Brunton. Despite almost two-thirds of people saying their workplace had a flexible working policy, three-quarters said they tried to sneak out quietly when using their workplace flexibility.
‘‘I’ve got seniors in my office who’ve always had flexible hours built into their contracts, but they’re still asking if they can leave at 4pm,’’ Whaley says. ‘‘I think we haven’t really trusted the people who’ve been around us, to allow us to be like that.’’
After lockdown, she issued a directive: ‘‘You need to mix it up.
I don’t want people saying soand-so didn’t arrive until 9.30am. I don’t care.’’
For level 2, the company introduced a roster system so no more than 10 people, rather than the usual 18, are in the office at once. It has also reduced car parking spaces by half.
‘‘If you’re rostered a desk space, it doesn’t mean you have to be there at 8am, it just means it’s available for you throughout the day,’’ Whaley says.
While working from home, many of her employees logged four to five hours of work a day, she says. However, they were bringing in more revenue overall.
Other businesses were also reporting employees were just as, if not more, productive while working from home. ‘‘This is an opportunity for businesses to rethink their office spaces. And it doesn’t have to be expensive.’’
While open-plan spaces were all about reducing costs, the drive to work from home is all about productivity benefits, she says – a winning strategy for business and staff welfare.
‘‘[Businesses] can probably chop 25-30 per cent of their floor space. They can save in car parking space. Employees will spend less time travelling and can have more flexibility.’’
To prevent returning to normal once the country returns to level 1, companies need to make major changes sooner rather than later, she says. ‘‘So start interviewing staff about what they want and need.’’
The benefits of having fewer people commuting to centrally located offices would go beyond increased productivity for individual businesses, she says. ‘‘All sorts of different issues would be solved. You could go to the hairdresser at 9am on a Tuesday, rather than having to take time out at the weekend.’’
Infometrics senior economist Brad Olsen agrees. Beyond working from home, the shift could see more people moving to smaller, more affordable parts of the country and working remotely. ‘‘With office space already approaching a slight oversupply state prior to Covid19 – particularly as Commercial Bay in Auckland was coming online – I wonder if there is a possibility of transforming/ retrofitting office buildings which may become excess to needs into apartments/ housing?’’
So what are businesses supposed to do with excess space? Elle Collins, founder of SpacetoCo in New Zealand, is pitching short-term space rentals as a way for businesses to recoup lost revenue.
The online platform that allows spaces to be listed and rented has been available only since June last year.
‘‘I thought, why can I book a bedroom on Airbnb, but I can’t book a meeting space online?’’
As well as helping businesses monetise existing assets, and allowing people to reschedule cancelled events, Collins hopes the platform will help foster a sense of community.
‘‘Could you book your next meeting at a local cafe, rather than going into the city?
‘‘Obviously the lockdown has been devastating for hospitality in particular. But think about all the weddings that’ll need to be rescheduled. Or, if you’re a bar, could you host breakfast meetings?
‘‘Music venues, small theatres, they’re often teetering on the edge as they’re not open during the day.
‘‘But a theatre can be a great place for a lecture, conference, private screening or even wedding venue.
‘‘It’s all about offering your space for different uses and being creative.’’
One ex-retail space in Onehunga, in Auckland, for example, has been used as a boardroom, arts studio, and dance rehearsal space.
While the number one booking request was for meeting spaces, people were also looking to host children’s birthday parties, photo shoots, and film locations.
Even when the immediate threat of Covid-19 passes, society, and its public spaces, are unlikely to return to normal any time soon, says Rebecca Burton, senior interior designer and associate principal at Jasmax, an architecture and design practice.
‘‘We certainly aren’t in a position to predict how things will pan out post-Covid, there are simply too many variables, but I think the realities of people’s feeling around Covid will last for a long time.’’
The main thing is the country has learnt how to be agile, she says. ‘‘There is technology to support us as we flex with each new challenge that comes our way.
‘‘Ultimately, I think the flexibility and agility we have learned to master in this time will be a tool that we take into the future.’’
People will likely be more cautious about touching common surfaces and being in crowded, confined spaces, she says.
‘‘Some of our clients are looking to widen streetscapes and are taking the opportunity to consider some of those changes that might mitigate highly populated areas where people congregate.’’
Like Whaley, she says businesses, and employees, need to be having discussions about long-term changes they’d like to see in their places of work, now.
Already, clients are changing office layouts to accommodate physical distancing requirements. Often that means halving office occupancy, Burton says.
Some are trying to reduce the number of ‘‘high-traffic touch points’’ by rearranging shared spaces such as kitchens and bathrooms, and replacing old taps with automatic ones.
‘‘Antimicrobial hardware seems to be a popular topic and suppliers I have spoken to recently are quickly sourcing and pulling together portfolios of appropriate products.’’
Metals such as copper, for example, are naturally antibacterial, she says.
Ahead of level 2, many organisations ran ‘‘very fastpaced internal audits’’ looking at the ability and inclination of staff to work remotely and gauging productivity and associated costs.
In some ways, the pandemic has seen a forced acceleration of how many people wanted to work anyway, she says.
However, there will always be a need for physical spaces for people to come together. ‘‘We are still social beings and human contact is important for creativity, thought generation, mental health and wellbeing.
‘‘There’s no substitute for face-to-face contact.’’
‘‘Everyone has issues with open-plan working, and we’ve been trying to solve them for years.’’
Lizzi Whaley