Power Reads: 5 Interesting Articles That Will Help You This Week

Each week, I select a few articles that rise above the fray and hopefully help you on your journey in leadership and the CRE world. They pull from one of four "corners": corporate real estate, technology, management science and anything positive. Each day we can become a better version of ourselves.

1. Baby boomers can’t stop staring at their phones

Too much screen time is something we usually associate with children. We think of little kids watching hours of CoComelon on iPads, or teens who would rather be absorbed in video games or YouTube than talk about their day.

“But there is another demographic that is struggling with putting down their devices: Baby boomers. Smartphones came into their lives late, but they were quickly won over. Now some of their children say they are hooked, staring at their screens constantly, even when they should be paying attention to their own grandchildren. Two-thirds of boomers own a smartphone and about 6 in 10 are on social media, according to a 2019 Pew Research Center survey.”

“My mother has become very attached to her phone over the last five years. Whenever we’re together, she’s often on her phone, usually scrolling through social media,” says Angela, 37, who declined to use her last name to avoid hurting her parents’ feelings. “It really only bothers me when my children are around because they’re often trying to get her attention, and she’s unaware they’re trying to get her attention because she’s on her phone.”

2. Younger Workers are Leading the Return-To-Office Charge…Kinda

The conversation surrounding the return-to-office movement has dragged on for so long that it’s beginning to sound repetitive. Occupiers and landlords are eager to get their employees back, but after the pandemic, employees are reluctant to leave the comfort of their home workstations. Poll after poll shows that employees would rather look elsewhere for work if their bosses called them back to the office five days a week, even as companies come up with eccentric methods to lure their staff back to the office. It’s old news, but the reality persists. Yet while the pandemic showed an alternative to mandatory office attendance, it didn’t destroy office markets altogether. Not only that, younger workers (you know, the group that’s supposedly the most opposed to in-person work) largely want to go back to the office. So maybe we’ve been having the wrong conversation all along.

“For numerous reasons, younger workers have been painted as the most resistant group to going back to in-person work. But the data seems to be pointing in the opposite direction. A joint survey conducted by economists from three universities (Stanford, University of Chicago, and ITAM) found that fewer than 25 percent of workers in their 20s who have the ability to work remotely on a full-time basis actually want to do so. ”

But this finding wasn’t as out-of-the-blue as you might expect. A few months prior, LinkedIn analyzed job applications that had been submitted on their platform and found that 20-24 year-olds are the least likely to apply to remote-only roles. Now, a lot of that could be attributed to the fact that Gen Z is the generation most likely to struggle with an overall lack of workspace at home. Many of these young professionals have recently graduated from college, which means that many of them are living with their parents or in a small apartment with roommates. 

3. Offices Are Still Empty on Fridays, So What Are Companies to Do?

If you feel like you’re seeing more tumbleweeds than co-workers in the office on Fridays, you’re not alone. Data from access control provider Kastle Systems confirms that the last day of the work week is consistently the most unpopular day to be in the office. It doesn’t take a workplace design expert to figure out why. After a work week, employees are already starting to anticipate their Friday evenings or get a jump on their weekend trips. No matter what the reason, hybrid work is leaving offices largely empty on Friday, and that’s putting some occupiers in a tight spot. 

“The Friday desertions we are seeing were brushed off last summer as the trend of “Summer Fridays,” a concept that reportedly took off in the 1960s when advertising agencies in Manhattan realized that employee productivity on Fridays during the summer months fell completely flat. Since then, many NYC offices allow their employees either a partial or full day off between Memorial Day and Labor Day. Gartner, a Connecticut-based technological research and consulting firm, found that 55 percent of organizations in North America were gearing up to offer “Summer Fridays” in 2019, a nine percent increase from the previous year. But now, of course, we’re in November, and Friday occupancy levels have barely picked up from the summer season.”

Even the biggest tech giants are noticing empty offices at the end of the workweek. In a recent interview with Apple CEO Tim Cook, Cook defended the return-to-work mandate (that Apple had rolled out back in September) with the argument that since Apple develops physical products, in-person collaboration is key for Apple’s success. “That takes the serendipity of running into people, and bouncing ideas off, and caring enough to advance your idea through somebody else because you know that’ll make it a bigger idea,” he said. However, Apple only mandated that employees come back three days a week, and there’s an apparent emptiness in Apple’s offices every Friday. “If you were here on a Friday, it would be a ghost town,” Cook added. 

4. Meta, Lyft, Salesforce and Other Tech Firms Dump Office Space as They Downsize

The big technology companies that drove U.S. office demand for years as they expanded their empires are now canceling leases and flooding business districts with office space as they downsize. 

“Facebook owner Meta Platforms Inc., Lyft Inc., Salesforce.com Inc. and other tech companies are shedding millions of square feet of office space in San Francisco, Silicon Valley, New York, Austin, Texas, and elsewhere. Amazon.com Inc. stopped construction in July on new office buildings amid a hiring freeze and is now preparing to lay off thousands of workers. ”

While leasing from all businesses declined during the pandemic, the tech sector accounted for the largest portion of the leasing that took place, according to real estate services firm CBRE Group Inc. Some tech companies, such as Alphabet Inc.’s Google, continued to expand their office footprints during that period.  

5. Beacon Sells K Street Office Building At A Loss 11 Months After Buying It

Less than a year after it acquired an office building near Farragut Square, Beacon Capital Partners has decided to sell it for a $1M loss.

“The Boston-based real estate investment firm sold 1735 K St. NW for $15.5M to Bernstein Management Co., according to the D.C. recorder of deeds.”

Beacon acquired the 97K SF, midblock property on Dec. 16 from the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority for $16.5M. At the time, the property served as FINRA's headquarters, but the regulator announced plans in October to move to 1700 K St., less than a block away.

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