Signature Associates

COVID-19 has transformed work. It could revolutionize the office next

Over the last decade, there’s been a marked shift in many office environments in metro Detroit.

Some companies based in spacious suburban offices with ample parking spaces moved to smaller and more expensive locations in downtown Detroit. Parking came in the form of packed garages, but these sacrifices were mostly considered justifiable because of the area’s walkability and proximity to new and trendy restaurants and bars that catered to the working professional crowd.

Inside, the offices generally had open environments where coworkers sat close together. Designer kitchens were stocked with snacks and areas for colleagues to mingle.

The coronavirus could change that.

Temporary changes have already begun, or will soon, from installing dividers between desks, restricting access to kitchens and other common areas and putting up signage about mask-wearing, hand washing and maintaining social distancing.

But some longer-term changes have already started, commercial real estate firms say, whether it’s leasing more space to accommodate for social distancing or companies considering leasing spaces in the suburbs if their employees don’t feel safe in the city.

Commercial real estate and architecture firms say it’s still early on in the pandemic and attitudes may change after there’s a vaccine, but they say COVID-19 is accelerating trends that were already in motion.

“Nothing is going away, but a lot is changing,” said Lisa Sauve, CEO of Synecdoche Design Studio in Ann Arbor, an architecture firm that designs workspaces, among other spaces.

Rethinking the office experience

Sauve started thinking about how the office needs to morph in order to be safe for employees after talking with the co-working space Bamboo Detroit. CEO Amanda Lewan was brainstorming ways to reconfigure the space, and Sauve came up with the idea for a partition that would physically separate work stations, called workwall.

That’s not the only change at Bamboo Detroit. Lewan is requiring anyone who enters the building to do a health screening and wear a mask. Tenants arrive at staggered times, as to not crowd the stairwell. Signs about maintaining distance and best cleaning practices are posted throughout the space. Common areas and the kitchen are closed, and the frequency of cleanings by managers in the space has increased.

“We’re rethinking the whole co-working experience,” said Lewan. “We’re making design changes to make co-working a thoughtful complement to working from home.”

Lewan sees the demand for co-working growing, if current trends take hold, and more employees are working from home on a daily basis.

“Work is going to have to be flexible because most people realize working at home is working for them,” she said. “Most corporations have seen that people can work from home. But it’s hard to collaborate virtually.”

Co-working spaces could become a place for these types of workers to get out of the house for a few days a week, she said. Or larger companies may use co-working spaces as satellite offices for employees that don’t live near headquarters, Lewan said.

When designing the workwall, Sauve thought about its future, too, and how it could be used when social distancing rules eventually relax.

“What’s the long-term use?,” said Sauve. “How might we redistribute it and adapt it for different scenarios?”

The partitions also can be used as whiteboards, and can be moved easily to coffee or meeting tables as a place to write when brainstorming.

“The rollback from the open office has already been happening,” Sauve said, a trend that will be further accelerated by COVID-19, rendering partitions like hers useless unless they can have another application.

Future flexibility

Bob Kraemer, principal of Kraemer Design Group, an architecture and design firm in Detroit, agrees that the move away from open offices has started.

He said before 2009, the standard space per employee was about 225 square feet. Then there was a push to reduce that amount, bringing the average down to 150 square feet per person, often accomplished by having employees sit at long tables right next to each other.

“We already saw in the last three to four years a desire to move away from it,” said Kraemer. “It’s too dense for people’s liking. We started to see this drift away and COVID will accelerate it.”

But that doesn’t mean the cubicle-filled offices of the ’90s are coming back.

In recent years, offices have gotten increasingly flexible, “but it’s not really that flexible,” said Kraemer. He expects to see partitions that can be easily moved, laptops for every employee so they can quickly transition to working from home and more touchless features, whether it’s a bathroom door that opens automatically or lighting that turns on when a person enters the room.

“For the last 10 years, clients have thought, ‘Do I really need this,’ ” he said. “Now that question has answered itself, for peace of mind and flexibility.”

Back to the ‘burbs

It’s not just what’s inside the office that could change. In the short term, offices could become bigger to accommodate for social distancing. Andy Gutman, president of Southfield-based commercial real estate firm Farbman Group, said he’s leased more space to companies in the medical field who are working with individuals one-on-one.

He expects other companies may need more space, dedicating more to the areas where employees work, and less to kitchen and common areas.

More space could be favored over downtown offices, which could change the office landscape in metro Detroit.

“The thing you saw with COVID is that high-density areas got hit the most,” said Gutman. “In downtowns, everyone is in such close proximity. With offices, the suburbs could become cool again.”

Gutman said he got two calls last week from tenants in downtown Chicago who were interested in opening up an office in the suburbs for employees who didn’t feel safe coming into the city.

In downtown Detroit, rents are higher compared to other neighborhoods and most suburbs, said Gutman, and the occupancy rate is high.

“At least in the foreseeable future, (the effects of COVID could) ease density in downtowns and fill back up in suburbs,” he said.

Posted By: Detroit Free Press on July 16, 2020. For more information, please click here to read the source article.

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