Bookmarks: 5 Interesting Articles That May Help You This Week

Each week, I select a few articles that rise above the fray and hopefully help you on your journey in the CRE world. They pull from one of four "corners": corporate real estate, technology, management science and anything positive. I welcome your comments on these articles.

1. A Soliloquy for the Office

Cushman & Wakefield

The nasty plague had changed everything. Or has it?

The pundits are screaming that we will all work at home, even after the sickness has left our land. The office is toast and huge portfolios of office product will be as devoid of life as a Walking Dead set.

But let me ask you a question…are you prepared to say you will never again go to a restaurant? How about a ball game? Yes, we must be able to safely attend, but when we can, I bet you will. And with gusto.

But what about the office? Well, post virus, there will of course be some changes to how knowledge workers use the office. Don’t think for a minute, though, that it is going away. Prognosticators have been predicting the end of the office market and other breathless “certainties” for decades and every time they are wrong (remember the paperless office?).

2. The Cubicle Is Back. Blame (or Thank) the Coronavirus

Getty Images

The cubicle is making a comeback.

As thousands of companies contemplate restarting operations, executives are weighing how best to reconfigure workspaces that have, by and large, been designed to minimize cost and foster the face-to-face interactions that can spread the deadly coronavirus.

Some companies are looking at high-tech approaches to enforce social distancing and track interactions, with location-monitoring apps and badges, artificial intelligence surveillance cameras, and high-tech health checks. Other innovations will be simpler: stickers to enforce 6 feet of distance between coworkers; staggered shifts that allow for more spacing; more regular cleanings; and of course oodles of hand sanitizer.

But one of the most important innovations may turn out to be cardboard or plastic dividers that turn open-plan offices into something more reminiscent of the 1980s.

3. Welcome back, cubicles? Longtime Silicon Valley CEO says coronavirus could kill the open office

Getty Images

Nothing will be the same when corporate America goes back to the office, and one longtime tech CEO believes a permanent change could be the death of the “open office.”

Carol Bartz, who led the architectural and engineering software maker Autodesk Inc. ADSK, -7.88% for a decade before heading up Yahoo Inc. during a turbulent period that began with the last recession, is known for being direct and speaking her mind. In a recent telephone interview with MarketWatch from her home in Silicon Valley, Bartz described the current age of COVID-19 as a “new game,” with “new rules” for everyone, and made a few predictions about how she expects life to change, especially at work.

“I think office space is going to change, [and] we will go back to putting shields between people,” she said, adding that, while she realizes this in the grand scheme amounts to minutiae, this is one of the many kinds of changes that CEOs are going to have to address in the future, in what will be the new life of the CEO. “We have to take the fear away from people,” she said, noting that this will probably be the first time offices will have to be designed around health factors.

4. Coronavirus Upheaval Triggers Corporate Search for Supply-Chain Technology

Similar decisions are taking place across scores of loading docks, warehouses and logistics management offices as companies of all sizes take a new look at technology that can help them adapt their operations to a changing business landscape under coronavirus restrictions.

Supply-chain upheaval from the pandemic is presenting the tech world with a sudden and unexpected proving ground for automation, digital platforms and other tools that had been low on the priority lists for companies’ logistics operations. From delivery software to mobile robots that help workers fulfill e-commerce orders, those offerings are drawing attention in industries where thin margins have often left companies clinging to older, highly manual operations.

“We’ve had countless calls from carriers saying they have shippers and drivers that want contactless paperwork” since the pandemic, said Frank Adelman, chief executive of transportation software company Pegasus TransTech LLC, which does business as Transflo.

5. Will the Work From Home Trend Impact Residential Design?

Gensler’s latest workplace research shows that most people’s preferred place to work is the office, even though many felt they were most effective when they had the option to work from home or remotely for part of the week. Now that COVID-19 has forced many out of the office and into a work-from-home situation, people have had to adapt. The need for an effective home office is a trend that won’t go away anytime soon.

As working from home gains acceptance and more roles are fulfilled in remote settings, the fundamental principles of workplace design will still apply — just in a residential context. In 2008, Gensler’s research established a framework for understanding work through the lens of four modes: focus, collaborate, learn, and socialize. We discovered that workplaces that integrated spaces to support all four of the work modes saw higher levels of employee engagement. How would these same four modes apply in a work from home model?

For starters, multifamily residential buildings will need to be rethought, both in terms of dwelling units and communal amenity areas. How do we do this while still addressing these four modes? How do you focus when the kids are home? How do you collaborate effectively on video calls when you’re trying to hide the pile of dirty dishes in the sink behind you? Do you really have an ergonomic workstation when you’re sitting in a dining room chair and your laptop is propped up on a milk crate on your dining table?

Your success blesses others. I wish you a great a hugely impactful week!