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. Companies Wrestle With Hybrid Work Plans—Awkward Meetings and Midweek Crowding

Big U.S. companies are discovering that “hybrid” work comes with plenty of complications.

As employers firm up plans to bring white-collar workers back into offices while still allowing them to do some work at home, many are encountering obstacles. Companies are grappling with what new schedules employees should follow, where people should sit in redesigned offices and how best to prevent employees at home from feeling left out of impromptu office discussions or being passed over for opportunities, say chief executives, board directors and others.

The insurer Prudential Financial Inc., which expects most of its roughly 42,000 employees to work in the office half the time starting after Labor Day, wants to make certain not all staffers choose to stay home Mondays and Fridays and then work in the office midweek. At the travel company Expedia Group Inc., executives are trying to figure out how to have in-person meetings that don’t disadvantage those who aren’t in the room.

2. Google to spend $7 billion on data centers and office space in 2021

Google says it plans to spend more than $7 billion on real estate across the U.S. in 2021 as it resumes spending in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.

The company said the money will go toward expanding offices and data centers across 19 states, creating what will amount to at least 10,000 full-time jobs. Some $1 billion will go specifically toward California.

“Coming together in person to collaborate and build community is core to Google’s culture, and it will continue to be an important part of our future,” CEO Sundar Pichai said in an blog post Thursday. “So we continue to make significant investments in our offices around the country, as well as our home state of California, where we will be investing over $1 billion this year.”

3. Apple CEO Tim Cook Expects a Post-Pandemic Return to the Office: 'I Can’t Wait'

Apple CEO Tim Cook, however, is now feeling bullish about returning to work.

"My gut says that, for us, it's still very important to physically be in touch with one another because collaboration isn't always a planned activity," he tells PEOPLE.

"Innovation isn't always a planned activity," Cook adds. "It's bumping into each other over the course of the day and advancing an idea that you just had. And you really need to be together to do that."

4. Microsoft’s Massive Moves In Atlanta Show How Much Has Changed For Big Tech After HQ2

When Microsoft announced last month that it is planning to build a large office campus in the Grove Park neighborhood in Westside Atlanta, it didn’t focus on the jobs it was creating or the incentives it was hoping to receive. The company committed to building affordable housing and gaining community trust before discussing a single square foot of office space.

“We understand the impact that an investment of this size has on a city like Atlanta,” Microsoft President Brad Smith wrote in a blog post. “It has huge potential, but if not done right, the downsides can outweigh this promise.”

The tone is a seismic shift away from how economic development deals have been announced in the past. Companies have traditionally signaled their intentions to expand or relocate to a new city, invited competing bids and anointed a winner.

5. Jim Cramer on his 2020 lessons: Do not bet on the end of the world

A year ago Tuesday the S&P 500 suffered its worst single-day decline in more than three decades in the midst of a severe weeks-long decline triggered by the global coronavirus pandemic.

Stocks have more than recovered from the swift plunge in prices, boosted by historic government intervention that helped to avert an even starker crisis, CNBC’s Jim Cramer said Tuesday.

“If you only learn one thing from the pandemic … I want you to remember that betting on the end of the world is a sucker’s game,” the “Mad Money” host said. “The next time you think the world is ending, you have to assume that it isn’t. I want you to take the other side of the trade. I want you to bet against the end of the world.”

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

Ken Ashley