sustainable office space in London?
When considering sustainability most people focus on their supply chain. How green their buildings are, the types of vehicles they use. And if they are manufactures or retailers how green their processes and products are. These are very important benchmarks but they are not the whole story. There is far more than you can do by embracing modern technology, modern working practices. And the way that you view your staff. sustainable office ideas. Currently, most people are employing on the premise who works in sustainable office space London that. They are getting paid for their time and the monetization. sustainable office building. Of this is a contract. That stipulates you will work for several hours per week with a holiday allowance and benefits. Meaning that to manage this agreement most businesses have evolved a culture of presenteeism.
Why do you need a sustainable office space in London? To facilitate this culture the office has evolved into a place that has to accommodate everyone. That works for the business along with everything that they need to do their jobs 100% of their working day. This, in turn, has created large commercial hubs with buildings full of people all traveling at the same time to and from these hubs on overcrowded transport links, causing many of these people to have commutes that can add between 25% & 50% to the hours they are contracted for but at their expense, not their employers. These commutes are generally very unpleasant often interspersing with aggressive. Interactions between people who are tiring and frustrating by these daily journeys.
So why do we do it?
There is two primary motivation that causes most people to seek employment, firstly money. We live in a society where it is very difficult. And it is made very unpleasant to try to survive. Without money so we go to work to earn the money. That we require to participate in the society that we live; the second primary motivation is social interaction, this is crucial for humans. We are not a species that does well in total isolation. And as far back as the 1980s and early 1990s. Some studies showed that for some people 75% of their motivation. Forgoing to work was social intersection, even back then. There was a significant minority of people whose only social interaction was work. And that was in the days before mobiles phone, iPads, everything online, and Facebook.
Is there a better way and what can business do to make a difference.
There is, firstly, businesses need to consider the standard. By which they monetize the contract that they have with their staff; it needs to change where ever possible from the number of hours. That people work to the output that they produce. Why do you need a sustainable office space in London? Hours worked is a Neanderthal and outdated way of monetizing this contract; the way that people work in the office has been revolutionizing over the past twenty-five years by technology. We’ve gone from paper-basing systems which meant that the best way to manage the process was to have all of the people. Who made up the team/s in the same building at the same time. To virtual systems allowing people to work and collaborate from anywhere, as the Covid-19 crisis is proving.
Why do you need a sustainable office space in London?
Technology now dictates that all information is holding electronically and can be accessing instantly from anywhere. Cloud technology enables people to collaborate and work on the same documents at the same time. Real-time audio-visual collaboration via video calls, chat rooms, and e-conferencing. So the requirement for everyone to physically be in the same place at the same time is over, it’s not necessary anymore. sustainable office building and ideas. So where does this leave the office, if people do not need to go to the office to carry out their jobs? How many people are going to voluntarily put themselves through the anguish of the daily commute? And if a lot of people no longer go to the office daily, what will the role of the office be and will we even need offices.
The answer to that is yes.
But hopefully not because people feel obliged to go, the office needs to become a different space, it needs to become somewhere that your staff wants to come to. Remote working can be isolating so it’s important to make sure your staff has all of the tools that they need to work remotely such as a stable document sharing platform, a good video conferencing platform and team chat room facilities so that when they are working remotely they are genuinely in a virtual office. sustainable office building. The physical office will be there as the base, somewhere to come to meet people, collaborate, and socialize with your colleague. sustainable office ideas. When people are at the office they need to be able to work as normal and very importantly there will also be people.
Who doesn’t want to work from home at all, there will be a core of people who do want to come to the office every day. So it is important to make sure that there are enough desk facilities to accommodate the staff who don’t want to work remotely as well as hot desk positions for those who do. But unlike the current model where most of the accommodation is based around workstations, there will be a greater emphasis on different types of collaboration, meeting, and social spaces so that teams can meet, collaborate and socialize.
sustainable office space in London
As mentioned earlier most people need the social interaction of work as for some people work is the only social interaction that they have and for those who have a good social life a good social experience at work is important because they value that aspect of their life. And very importantly teams who play together work better together, in all walks of life the most successful teams are teams who get on, where the barriers are removing and a common goal establishing and nothing does that better than play. If a team wants to come to the office to collaborate and meet and they choose to do it on Thursday because Thursday night is the best night out in the town that you’re in then embrace it.
sustainability
Let them come in at 10.00 work until 6.00 with an hour in the corporate space to socialize and relax before they go out as a team for the evening. This is a good thing, it’s not your staff taking advantage of your good nature it’s your business building strong team dynamics and the fact that they can do this with the knowledge that all they need to do on Friday morning is to be logging on at a reasonable time to fulfill their contractual output for the day, as violating to getting up at 05.30 am to be herding onto their 1hr 30min commute is also good.
As an employer you will benefit from this new dynamic, good teams self-manage and the weak links will more often than not be taken to task by the team, there have and always will be people who are deliberately destructive but if you’ve got a strong team with a common goal the ability of these individuals to detrimentally affect your business is massively reducing and more often than not they will move on because they won’t have a platform to create the negativity that they crave.
So how does all of this relate to sustainability
It’s very simple, by encouraging a culture of flexibility in the workplace people will travel less, and when they travel they will travel at different times, so congestion on public transport and the roads during rush hour will reduce, meaning that the peaks in congestion and pollution that we currently experience will reduce, leaving us with more consistency of passenger numbers on public transport. Through the day supporting a more sustainable and comprehensive public transport model for the future. This new way of working will reduce the use of cars especially in our Cities which will again reduce pollution. Working virtually in its purest form requires less paper as everything is electronic, and if there is less paper. Then it follows that there will be less paraphernalia associating with the management and storage of paper.
So the pollution creating by the manufacture and use of these products many of them plastic will also reduce. sustainable office ideas. Along with the benefit to our forests that are harvesting to make the paper in the first place. So this truly is a virtuous circle, happier more fulfilled people, less pollution. sustainable office building. And a more sustainable public transport system. All achieved in part by changing the way that we view and engage with employees.
What I’ve described probably isn’t going to be a world. That we are likely to see in the next five years. But it has to start somewhere the younger generations. Who has been brought up with technology to understand it and live with it in the same way as? The previous generation lived with daily papers and PG tips? And as they enter and progress through the workplace they are going to insist on these changes. With companies who embrace the changes succeeding and companies who don’t struggle.