FOCUS WORKPLACE
THE WHEEL’S TURNING Ann Clarke, Director of The Future Workplace at nationwide workplace
consultancy and interior design business Claremont, suggests the Hub
and 6poke oƝ Fe FoXld be the IXtXre oI the ZorkplaFe
Just over a year ago – the world
wondered if the o ice was dead and
permanent homeworking would be the
pandemic’s legacy. Now, with 12 months
of remote working under our collective
belts and a clear desire among employees
to return to the workplace for some of
the working week – we have turned our
attentions to how the o ice must respond.
The hub and spoke o ice model is one
concept gaining traction as it o ers greater
flexibility and reflects a new set of behaviours
- but what does it really mean for businesses
and their FM teams? And how does it impact
ergonomics?
Hub and spoke describes the idea of having
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one primary central or head o ice, typically in
a city centre – with smaller satellite o ices or
flexible spaces in secondary locations which are
closer to where employees live.
Intended to o er the best of both worlds
it means that employees don’t have to
commute to a city centre space and instead
can access smaller localised workspaces for the
collaboration and community that homeworking
doesn’t o er. With fewer people commuting
every day, large expensive head o ices can be
reimagined as dynamic brands hubs - all while
occupying smaller footprints and realising cost
savings.
The pandemic is the biggest driver of this
model and it serves to highlight the changing
dynamics of how and where work is done. In
turn, it presents a compelling opportunity for
employers to look at the role of the workplace
with fresh eyes – a process that starts with
understanding how our relationship with the
o ice has been changing for some time.
Even before lockdown there was a significant
downturn in peak desk occupation and an
increase overall in empty desks – just 46
per cent of desks were occupied in 2019/20.
Interestingly average use of meeting rooms
was only 35 per cent and collaboration spaces
recorded a similarly dismal occupancy of 16 per
cent overall. Despite the drive for purposeful
co-worker collaboration of recent years, the
settings provided by many organisations have