A Human-Centric Office
CBRE Japan prototype Workplace Strategy
Many companies have been struggling to create the right activity-based working (ABW) office environment for their hybrid workforce, missing opportunities to create an engaged and high-performance workforce while investing significantly in their office fit out. The successful office aims to bring people closer together by implementing the right space, systems, and skills, while delivering financial benefits. To achieve that goal, we have developed a Human-Centric Office, and this document outlines the key features for CBRE Japan's Tokyo headquarters.
Business and employment context
• Currently, companies in Japan are facing the challenge of achieving higher growth amidst rising inflation, as well as increasing difficulty in securing sufficient human capital.
• Organizations are embracing a more diverse workforce, in terms of age, gender, tenure, and personalities for instance, in order to be more innovative.
• Meanwhile, Japanese talents’ top criteria for job selection are evolving. There is a higher expectation for flexibility in terms of working hours and location (home, office, other). Also talents are looking for employers committing to a healthy work-life balance.
Employees in CBRE want to continue to do hybrid work
46% 30%
Less than 5 years
More than 10 years
Against this backdrop, the right workplace transformation is required - both in terms of physical environment (workspace) and organizational development (people).
Transforming an office in Japan is a costly investment, hence there is a need to carefully identify the indirect and direct financial benefits of such investment, before deciding to spend money. CBRE’s new Tokyo office is an evolution, or co-evolution as we call it internally, of our former award-winning office, aiming at supporting our business ambitions for the next five years. Our primary objective is to create an inclusive, resilient, and vibrant community, which would be a prototype to prepare us for the future of work.
CBRE's former Tokyo offices included Shiba Park and Marunouchi, with a total footprint of :
2 locations 1,430 tsubo 2.0 tsubo / per person
1 location 1,585 tsubo 93%
Renovate and consolidate CBRE's Tokyo offices in its main location in Marunouchi :
1.7 tsubo / per person
CBRE employees' tenure
Creating an inclusive community 1
Workspace Features
• Attract and retain diverse talents
• Support a healthy work-life balance
Employees want to choose where to sit in the office in order to work efficiently
Employees feel individual productivity increased as a result of the transition to flexible seating
• Create an environment that expresses CBRE’s vision
Global CBRE Vision
Create the real estate solutions of tomorrow, so businesses and people thrive.
• Our employees have the flexibility to choose where to work (office, home, other) in order to fit different workstyles and life situations. When in the office, employees have a full choice on which space to use in order to best support their productivity.
• The office offers a very large variety of quickly accessible spaces, both open and enclosed, including an increased choice of focus and confidential work settings, to cater for various work activities and personality traits.
A very large variety of quickly accessible spaces
Supporting healthy workstyles
Flexible and well-being focused furniture settings are provided (height-adjustable desk, wide displays) as well as amenities supporting a healthier work-life balance (massage services, shower room, nap room, healthy food café, mother’s room)
People Features
We have created a program to help employees identify their personality traits (MBTI) and better understand each other’s differences, thereby contributing to the development of a more bias-free and considerate mindset towards oneself and others.
Our Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Network regularly organizes events, and facilitates the creation of common interest groups (e.g. working parents group).
高Height-adjustable desks Wide displays
Healthy food café
Mother's room
1st nap room in a Japanese office
Massage services WELL & LEED certification
Creating a resilient community 2
Workspace Features
• Optimize costs to maximize return on investment
The required footprint has been defined through a fact-driven approach based on utilization data, allowing space and cost optimization.
Our office uses less space than a traditional fixed desk office
1.7 tsubo / per person 44% less space
Headcount growth possible within current footprint
There is no territory for any line of business (LOB) * (no group-address or equivalent) with several project spaces, allowing smooth organizational changes and cross-LOB collaboration without the need to modify the layout.
• Increase market share through business agility and innovation
27 LOBs entirely share the whole office space without dedicated areas 23%
We created CBRE Idea Lab to be a platform for change, fueling innovation, creativity, and technological advancements in the real estate industry, and to consistently deliver high-value solutions to our clients.
CBRE Idea Lab is the first lab dedicated to real estate innovation for CBRE global, and also in the Japan market.
It is both a workspace where our employees can learn about the latest technology trends and techniques, and also a platform for us to share innovative ideas, connecting our clients with emerging technologies and innovative solutions.
Our multi-purpose spaces allow us to help clients connect together through various events, and, with the CBRE Idea Lab, bring them closer to an ecosystem of innovative organizations. People Features
Training participation rate by leaders and managers in CBRE Japan
Average training courses
courses per manager
• A series of training programs are in place to support managers and leaders in managing their teams' objectives, and maximizing their ability to lead, coach, and mentor independently of where people work.
• In order to create a sustainable organization, we have put in place succession plans for heads of businesses as well as talent assessment processes. We have also internal incentives to: 1) promote a proactive
culture, by establishing a self-development KPI for all employees, where each individual decides what to focus their development on; and, 2) encourage a collaborative culture.
• We are currently setting up an innovation champion group and program to initiate business innovations through internal collaboration and external partnership leveraging the growing PropTech market in Japan.
Number of events held in CBRE Idea Lab Number of event participants
Creating a vibrant community 3
Workspace Features
• Have a highly-utilized office with an appropriate level of “fullness”*.
* “Fullness” is a new metric identifying how an office feels full on average when employees have the choice to work remotely or in office.
Headcount on average in office 50% Level of Fullness
• Increase employee engagement, and make employees keen to bring visitors to the office.
Visitors to the office
over 250 companies approx.1000 visitors
In addition to providing basic space for efficient individual work (see Part 1, Creating an inclusive Community), the office provides a wider variety of collaboration spaces and sizes, including spaces for a team to book for a few hours or full day (“Team pop-up” spaces), and a large café for internal/external events, as well for individual work.
Proportion of collaboration spaces increase Café event capacity up to
people
• The office provides a high-end hospitality experience for visitors, with full-time concierge services, café drinks, confidentiality-enabled meeting rooms, aroma in the reception, etc.
Closing comments
• We regard the new office as a prototype, and will continue to experiment and learn though our annual post-evaluation assessment. We will share our findings in the next whitepaper.
• In order to maximize the success of investing in a new office, it is crucial to identify its purpose and KPIs, and how to measure the outcome. If you are planning to embark on this journey, we suggest starting by assigning an executive sponsor (either the CEO or one of the board members) and organizing a strategic planning team with the CHRO, and leaders from the
• Art elements have been added in the reception and across the floors to spark imagination and interactions. Art pieces include a Japanese sculpture, paintings, and AI-generated images.
Number of art pieces
corporate planning department and key business units. We then propose collecting data points across the organization, and to align leaders on the future workstyle, behaviors, and culture through visioning sessions.
• Should you wish to learn more about these initial steps, or are interested in what follows, please reach out to the CBRE Workplace Strategy team. Our professionals have helped clients of all sizes and industries realize their workplace vision, and we invite you to contact us to learn how we can help you achieve yours.
• CBRE Japan is subsidizing the creation and management of internal activity clubs by employees to promote networking and support work-life balance.
• We measure our employee engagement score on a yearly basis, with follow-up actions defined by each LOB, and managers’ KPIs set to increase the score.
• Annual 360 transparency surveys are implemented to foster more open communication between employees.
Contacts
