The pandemic showed us that employees need not spend one-third of their lives glued to their desks to maximize productivity.
This has led to companies adopting a hybrid work model where employees have greater work flexibility.
The responsibilities of facility managers have also increased post the adoption of this new way of work. They must now optimize the office space to ensure effective space utilization.
And to do so, managers must get insights into their employees’ needs.
This way, when they get to the office, they find it is designed according to their needs.
The only problem? Optimizing space usage is more complex in the hybrid work setup. Especially because it is harder to predict the employee footfall and optimize space accordingly.
But how precisely can you achieve office space utilization? Keep reading to find out.
How to Get Space Utilization Right for Your Office?
1. Use Sensors to Get Real-Time Space Utilization Metrics
Self-reported space usage data is easy to gather. But it is far from reliable. You cannot expect employees to remember the number of times they frequented an office space or how often they booked a desk.
Besides, employee space usage trends may differ from their memory.
This is why companies use occupancy sensors to collect space usage data instead.
These sensors obtain and relay accurate, real-time space utilization data, thus allowing managers like you to observe the following:
- How is the overall space used in an office?
- Which desks and corners are over-utilized?
- Which desks and corners are underutilized?
- Which resources are over and underutilized?
With this information, you can change office layouts to boost space utilization.
2. Switch to Meeting Management Software to Ensure Meeting Space Utilization
Suppose two employees have to brainstorm for an ongoing project, and they book a boardroom instead of using a smaller huddle room.
At the same time, a team of 14 members has to discuss a pending project, but they cannot find an available meeting room to accommodate all attendees.
Now, the team with a more important project cannot complete their tasks solely due to improper bookings.
A meeting management software lets workers view all available rooms based on the meeting purpose and the number of attendees.
If the office has implemented this tool, they could ensure optimal space utilization. Moreover, they could prevent excessive bookings of certain meeting rooms.
Moreover, the room booking solution also gives managers space usage data. With such data, facility managers can understand how, where, and when the workers use meeting rooms.
They can further decide how to reimagine meeting rooms to boost space utilization.
For instance, if facility managers find that a small meeting room is underused. Simultaneously, they observe workers demand more coworking spaces at the office.
Managers could easily convert the unused small meeting room into a common huddle area.
This would boost space utilization, ensure greater employee productivity and even save utility costs.
3. Provide an Agile Work Environment for Employees
As per Office Occupier Sentiment Survey, over 50% of respondents expected flexible office spaces to form a large part of their real estate portfolio.
And those providing flexible office spaces were already testing alternative space utilization strategies.
A space management software can make planning and implementing flexible work setups easier in a hybrid workplace.
Managers can estimate office space utilization based on employee footfall projections and make the necessary arrangements like changing desk and meeting room setups before the new employees arrive to work.
They can even test out multiple office layouts before implementing one that ensures optimal space utilization. Thus they can save on unnecessary expenses too.
Managers can implement flexible desking setups to reduce office space usage further. And they can find the optimal number of desks needed for this using space management software.
Once they have the required desks, managers can further implement desk booking software to streamline flexible desk bookings.
This way, employees can book their preferred desks or workstations based on availability.
At the same time, all the office workers can be assured of dedicated desks, and managers can ensure optimal space utilization.
Final Thoughts
To design a successful hybrid workplace, optimum office space usageis key.
If you are searching for a dedicated tool to improve office space utilization, try WorkInSync.
It provides you with cloud-based space utilization software that is easy to install and integrate with your other tools such as Slack, Google Calendar, and more.
Managers can access the software from anywhere in the world.
They can use it to check space usage, manage available space and generate easy-to-interpret reports based on employee space usage data.
Hence, to ensure optimal space utilization in your office, get WorkInSync space management software today.
From measuring space utilization to helping you track the number of people in the office, from managing floor plan to workplace management, the software is built to help better space planning.
To learn more about WorkInSync and its space management software, schedule a demo.