The Evolving Community Manager Role

Attracting Talent and Tenants in the “Multiverse of Work”

By: Phil Mobley, Avison Young

Over the past decade, users of commercial space have increasingly viewed their locations and spaces through the lens of talent optimization: Attracting it, retaining it, and getting the most out of it while at “work.” The most forward-looking companies looked at their workplaces not just as places to gather, but as a vital support system for their people.

To help their tenants deliver these high-performance, experiencefocused workplaces, building owners and managers ramped up their focus on amenities, both physical and digital. This came at a cost, of course. But in the context of competition for talent—and, by extension, lease deals—the investment was a bargain.

Or so everyone in commercial real estate thought until the COVID-19 pandemic forced most knowledge workers to retreat to their homes, many of them for a year or more. Now, some companies—especially the big tech firms who have long been at the forefront of workplace design—are selling a new twist on the workplace as a recruiting tool: The flexibility to work remotely.

Remote work is not new. According to a 2020 survey by Global Workplace Analytics (GWA), about a third of knowledge workers worked remotely at least one day per week before the pandemic. Now, three quarters of them want to keep it up. And a Gartner study suggested that 60 percent would only consider a job that offered remote flexibility.

Has remote work rendered obsolete the kind of human-centered workplaces that cutting-edge employers have been building for the last few years? It now appears that the CRE industry will avoid the nightmare “death of the office” scenario. the pandemic, Avison Young uncovered some principles that will guide the next evolution of workplaces optimized for human performance. We call it “The Multiverse of Work.”

Why do we still need offices?

To the amazement of many, knowledge workers were quite productive at home during the pandemic. But maybe this should not have been so surprising. Academic research had already shown that, under the right circumstances, remote work could be a productivity accelerator. Ctrip, a Shanghai-based travel agency, conducted an experiment in 2013 that showed a 13% productivity gain among call center employees who started working remotely. When the company later opened the remote option to more employees, they saw an even bigger boost. They also reported higher job satisfaction and lower attrition.

But the full story is more complicated. Call center work is less complex and collaborative than most other knowledge work, not to mention easier to measure. Ctrip’s results may not be generalizable. Furthermore, employees who worked remotely were less likely to be promoted, and when given the choice, half of them went back to the office. Other research suggests that workers spending too much time (more than about 50 percent) remote start to lose connections with coworkers and supervisors, to the detriment of performance.

Pandemic-era surveys also showed nuanced results. In the GWA survey cited above, only about one in every six knowledge workers sought to be remote every day, with the vast majority wanting the ability to go to an office at least occasionally. And according to workplace research firm Leesman, workers want to split their time roughly evenly between home (or another convenient remote location) and the office. One reason for this is that not everyone has had as uniformly positive an experience working remotely. GWA has shown that, while 70 percent of all workers feel successful working at home, less than half of Gen-Zers (those under 25 who are currently entry-level employees) do. Leesman’s research has revealed that these younger workers actually want more time in the office than their older counterparts. It stands to reason that a generation of workers who are more likely to live in smaller spaces with more people around them would therefore find it more difficult to create good workspaces at home.

Age is just one dimension. There are other challenges, including technology. For example, a 2020 Stanford study found that about a third of workers lack a reliable broadband connection capable of supporting video conferencing. For workers with technical challenges, unwieldy space configurations, and family or roommate distractions at home, access to an office is vital to success.

Serving the segment of workers who desperately need a dedicated workplace is not the only benefit of the office. For nearly all workers, corporate workplaces meet a broader spectrum of workplace needs far more fully than home offices can. The reasons for this are intuitive. Reliable broadband and a quiet place to focus are workplace analogs to the basic needs for food, clothing, and shelter at the bottom of Abraham Maslow’s famed hierarchy.

But higher-order needs for belongingness and recognition are just as important in the context of work as they are more generally. Without them, people cannot perform at their best.

Does workplace quality really matter?

In short, workers want the flexibility to work both remotely and at the office. And offices are optimal for some workers all the time and for all workers some of the time. Thus, the existence of a variety of workplaces is important. But what about the quality of those workplaces?

It turns out that quality is also crucial, both remote and at the office. According to Leesman, when workers have an inadequate home working setup—if, for example, they cannot close the door to a dedicated space, or they lack technical or ergonomic equipment—they will spend more time in the office than they might otherwise want. In that sense, a poor work environment at home pushes people to the office.

In another sense, a great office can also pull people in. In Leesman’s analysis of one organization’s different locations, they found that those working at the high-performing office (as measured by their proprietary Leesman Index) wanted to spend most of their workdays there. By contrast, those relegated to the low-performing office wanted to work remotely more often than not.

What will life in the Multiverse look like?

What will this look like for knowledge workers? There is certainly no single answer. Companies in different industries will have different answers, and those competing in the same industry will doubtless experiment with various workplace models to attract talented workers. But we can already place bets on some consistent themes that are likely to emerge. First is a renewed focus on wellness. In the post-pandemic world, this will have many aspects, from air quality to mental health to surface cleaning to ergonomics. As just one data point, consider Herman Miller’s finding that 85 percent of people are experiencing at least some physical discomfort while working remotely! Long after COVID protocols have receded, the importance of wellness in the workplace will remain.

A second theme is workplaces fit more for the purpose of collaborative work, rather than simply a place to warehouse people doing individual tasks. The key word is choice, which here applies not only to where and when to come to the office, but also how to work once there. The best offices will offer a variety of work modes within the space (through, for example, providing various “neighborhoods”).

Importantly, purpose-built offices must still include dedicated space for focus work! It may be true enough that not everyone will need an assigned desk. Yet even if intentional collaboration will be the main reason for coming to the office, people still need spaces to detach, if only for a short amount of time. Neglecting this need will sabotage any office.

The rise of various flexible office solutions will be a third hallmark of the Multiverse. Many tenants will try to reduce their footprints to optimize for a smaller number of every-day attendees at the office. But managing the ebbs and flows will be a huge challenge, and landlords that offer flexible suites or coworking areas onsite or nearby could be at an advantage.

The suburbs could be another opportunity for flex offerings to flourish. As noted above, some workers need an office more frequently than others, but they may still want to avoid a soul-crushing daily commute. Companies that support these workers with flexible near-home solutions will be well positioned to retain them.

Finally, expect an accelerated focus on PropTech. Making the most out of future workplaces will require technology to manage and measure access, utilization, and health. And the need for clear, seamless communication between building owners/operators and occupants has never been more apparent. These areas represent opportunities for tighter collaboration between landlords and their customers, possibly including sharing both data and the cost of implementation.

The future world of knowledge work will be far more expansive than most people imagined just a few years ago. It will align not only with worker preferences for flexibility, but also with better results through optimal human performance. The solutions will be complex. But companies and buildings that execute it well will reap the reward of attracting the best and brightest to their spaces.

About the Author

Phil Mobley has served the commercial real estate (CRE) industry as a researcher and consultant for over 15 years. He specializes in providing analyses that help the industry deliver high-value workplaces for tenants, a need that continues to evolve.

As Director of US Occupier Research at Avison Young, Phil shapes and leads the firm’s approach to understanding occupiers’ businesses and their dynamic need for commercial space. His work supports multiple service lines by identifying new ways to meet both landlord and occupier client needs.

Three TOPICS ESSENTIAL TO THE TENANT SATISFACTION SURVEY

By: Molly Looman, BOMA Georgia

Tenant satisfaction surveys are an essential tool for property managers looking to improve their properties. Surveys can reveal gaps in the tenant experience, unknown maintenance challenges, or areas of opportunity. The data gained from these surveys can help property teams improve spaces and stay occupied.

Here are the three topics that should be addressed in your tenant satisfaction survey.

Maintenance

Many tenants may have a strong feeling about the maintenance process in their building one way or another. The tenant satisfaction survey is a great place to identify repeating issues or confirm that a system is working well. Asking tenants if they have been satisfied with their maintenance experience is essential. This is also a time to engaged the building engineering staff in the creation and review of a tenant survey. There may be a new system they want feedback on, or they may benefit from hearing about different tenant pain points. This could lead to creative problem solving that could benefit the tenant and the buildings.

This is also the opportunity to ask about the tenant’s experience with the work order system. Whether it is paying rent or requesting maintenance, getting feedback about your tenant portal can either ensure its running smoothly or uncover a system issue. This is an easy way to double-check a system in your building is working as expected.

If the tenant provides constructive criticism and the same issue is seen multiple times, that may be an opportunity for growth and re-evaluation of a certain system’s operations. If the feedback is consistently positive, this may be a great place to ask for a review that can be publicly shared. Make sure to review results with maintenance and building engineering staff so that they can offer insights on the comments and coordinate a plan moving forward.

Leasing

An anonymous tenant satisfaction survey is a great place to ask tenants what they want to see in the property. Perhaps there have been needs or desires that they have not shared with the property team before but asking directly may provide more results.

Ask about what amenities might be worth a rent increase or what their dream space might look like. Ask them what their priorities are whether it be environmental, convenience, or price. Asking direct questions that leave space for longer feedback will help property teams identify the long-term needs of the tenants in their building.

After the COVID-19 pandemic, surveys became extremely useful in figuring out tenant’s returnto-work plans, their desire for extra cleaning, their ability to pay for enhanced air quality or surface treatment and other health and safety factors that affect the building and the tenants.

People

With so many plates spinning, it can sometimes be difficult for a property manager to keep up with the tenants’ satisfaction given the multitude of staff that works on a property. A tenant survey is a great way to gain feedback, not only on the staff that maintains the property but on the property management team itself.

Find out if there are issues with response times, efficiency, or even friendliness. There may be a process that could use a review. Overall, the purpose of the tenant satisfaction survey can help identify if the management is providing a positive experience and if the level of communication is where it needs to be.

This is a great tool for finding out if the property team needs to spend more time in the building and whether or not your tenants feel your presence. As a leader, you can use this tool to discover the extent to which different property managers are achieving their goals at their properties. While tenant surveys should never be the sole factor in deciding performance, they can validate a team member’s success.

This can also help advise your staffing needs. Maybe the results will indicate you are over or understaffing a property. Maybe they will indicate the need for a new position like a receptionist. It could also show a need for a change in workflow or communication if tenants feel their requests are not being dealt with in a timely manner. While not all the feedback will be actionable on the hiring front, it can be good to keep track of sentiments surrounding that topic over a number of years.

Helpful Hints

What you cover in the survey is just as important as how you ask it. Shy away from yes or no questions and phrase questions on a disagree to agree sliding scale. If it is a yes or no question, consider having a text box for longer feedback or asking open-ended questions.

Remember to keep the length of the survey and the frequency of the survey reasonable so that participants fill it out completely. Consider using incentives like a raffle or a gift card for participants that complete the survey. The larger the sample size, the more accurate a read a property manager will get on the state of their building’s management and operations.

Be sure to make sure the survey requests feedback on actionable items while leaving a comment section for other thoughts the participant my have. You don’t want to request feedback on something that is unchangeable. An effective survey requests actionable information that helps participants feel heard.