How do employees envision office/work in the post-COVID era?
As EurAsia Proptech Initiative, together with Assembly Buildings, we conducted a survey to understand what measures would be welcomed/considered safer by employees. At the end of the survey, we have added two open-ended questions. The answers to those questions that I shared below are quite insightful and shed some light on the future of work/office to entrepreneurs, developers, operators, human resources, architects, and consultants.
Our first question was “If your company will commence and/or continues remote working policy, what service(s) you think you need from them?
Below are the main topics;
- Accessing company data and tools, VPN
- Online memberships (fitness)
- Internet connection, snack, and beverages
- Courrier service
- Mental, wellness and psychological support
- Ergonomic work environment
- IT support
- Shuttle service
The second open-ended question was “How do you envision offices in the future?”. Below are the responses;
- The future is uncertain. People will forget. I don’t expect any drastic changes.
- Architectural design will be different. There will be two different gates for entries and exits from the buildings.
- Certificate: A certificate for workspaces where higher standards and efforts are being implemented against the virus.
- Voice and/or motion-activated hardware.
- Smaller offices.
- Low rise buildings and banned elevators
- Larger sqm per person, remote working, green building standards becoming mandatory.
- Smaller offices with finance and HR teams only.
- I expect a downturn trend for new office years to come.
- Everything will be the same. Maybe a little bit of social distancing.
- In the future, offices will only serve to prestigious needs.
- There will be a rotational and/or full home-office setup.
- I hope remote working will stay after the pandemic. I wish the transformation has started willingly not forcefully.
- Nothing is going to change. Just let me keep my job, that would be all.
- Less commuting, more hygiene, we’re still social animals as human beings!
- More oxygen, more open spaces.
- Personalized offices.
- Good air circulation system.
- Capsule modules.
- Home-office.
- More personal areas, the transformation of open offices.
- Everything will be back to normal in the long run.
- Office usage will be much less in the future.
- Soon, everyone will understand that we don’t need to go to the office to work.
- Faster digital transformation, buildings with large open areas, no elevators.
- Offices will be used part-time with scheduling tools.
- Nothing will be changed in the short term. We’re not institutional, still have a boss/owner mentality.
- Remote working should stay after the pandemic is over. We should not be limited to buildings. Cafes, homes will be our offices.
- The future is remote-working and flex-working.
- I expect a future where companies provide shuttle services to their employees
- Offices will be obsolete.
- We don’t need offices anymore. Remote working is the future.
- I expect flex working will accelerate.
- Separated, no name work stations/tables.
- Remote working should be extended.
- Commuting to an office and spend 8 hours is coming to an end.
- I envision home-office and/or hybrid home-office.
- I’ll be able to tell you one month later.
- Offices could be places where you visit half-day a week.
