Optimising desk and workspace utilisation

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1 Tel: +44 (0) Optimising desk and workspace utilisation unlocking the potential of your real estate

2 Optimising desk and workspace utilisation unlocking the potential of your real estate The bottom line Why does workspace and desk optimisation matter? Let s not kid ourselves optimising the utilisation of desk space, IT resources, meeting rooms and other facilities can be a demanding and potentially disruptive process. So why bother? The answer is simple. The potential benefits for the majority of corporate organisations, in terms of both cost and operational efficiency, vastly outweigh any downside. 1. Drive down the cost of real estate Real estate represents one of the largest costs on any corporate P&L, and the relentless demand for property in the financial centres of the world means that there remains continual upwards price pressure. City centre desk space already costs an average of 10,000 per year per unit to service (and 15,000 or more in some locations). Historically, this was an unavoidable cost the more people you had, the more desks. Technology and new ways of working offer a tantalizing glimpse of an alternative future one in which reducing real estate costs can unlock annualized savings running to millions of pounds. 2. Ensure the efficient use of existing facilities In an organisation where hundreds, if not thousands, of people are working in complex and flexible patterns every single day, across multiple floors, multiple buildings or even a global complex, how can you be sure that the desks, the hot desks and the meeting rooms are in the right places for efficient day-to-day operations? That there s the right number of desks and other facilities? That the departments using the facilities are the ones paying for them?

3 3. Monitor the impact of changing working patterns Nearly every organisation is changing the way its people work. Hot-desking, home working and Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) approaches all have the potential to create more flexible, efficient ways of working. But if you re left paying for empty desks and meeting rooms while everything around you has gone remote, mobile or virtual well, those efficiencies will simply never arrive. 4. Improve future real estate planning Whether you re reorganising, expanding or contracting, optimising change strategies requires real insight into patterns of working and facilities use. Taking on too much new space or failing to provide sufficient facilities can both be equally damaging. And how can you future-proof your real estate and facilities provision if you don t know how current estate is really being used? Excel I.T. Ltd Trafalgar House, 712 London Road, Grays, Essex RM20 3JT +44 (0)

4 Optimising desk and workspace utilisation unlocking the potential of your real estate Most managers and staff significantly over-estimate how much desk space is really being occupied in the working environments. While managers often imagine a desk-utilisation rate of 100% for administrative staff and around 60-70% for management and professional staff, this is usually far from the case. In fact, desks in corporate workspaces are generally used less than 60% of the time. Why so little? Well, there are always a few empty desks from people who are on holiday, are sick, or who have left and are yet to be replaced. Then there are likely to be full-time desks for part-time people. And the impact of working patterns is enormous all of the people who are in meetings (often long ones), or are away working with other departments, or with external clients, or on training courses. And increasingly some are probably working from home too. All of this means your desk and space utilisation is lower than it should be.

5 The information gap In optimisation strategy, as in everything, knowledge is power. To optimise your workspaces, to develop more efficient real estate strategies and to win support for your change strategies, you are going to need some fairly fundamental information. But which of the following can you curently assess? 1. How many square feet of property are occupied? 2. How many users need desks? 3. How many desks available? 4. What is the average cost of each desk per year? 5. How efficiently is each space used? By user? By department? By floor? Nationally? Globally? 6. How are decisions made as to whether more or less space is required? And it s at Question 5 where real estate optimisation programmes most often fail. Incomplete, inaccurate or out-of-date data can all reduce the best intentions to mere guesswork. The holy grail of workspace utilisation is a real-time schema of desktop utilisation. So how can you get that? Excel I.T. Ltd Trafalgar House, 712 London Road, Grays, Essex RM20 3JT +44 (0)

6 Optimising desk and workspace utilisation unlocking the potential of your real estate The tools of the trade The secret to successfully rationalising the use of real estate is the collation and analysis of data that accurately reflects the real time ebb and flow of space utilisation around the corporate space. A variety of approaches have been developed to try to achieve this. Survey / interviews: The most basic solution is to ask everyone to fill in a survey document, with details of how long they spent at their desk and when. The principle problem is one of accuracy the eventual data will be based on incomplete returns, opinion and perception (most people think they spend longer at their desk than they do). It might help you make a few quick wins, but not much more. Physical survey: Taking sample data every few hours by walking around the site with clipboards can provide more accurate average utilisation figures, but again lacks the depth required to help you really understand how the space is being used. For example, it cannot tell you the maximum and minimum occupancy levels since different desks are being recorded at different times, nor remote workers who are using a VPN to access their desktop. Sensors: Solutions based on under-desk sensors resolve some of the problems concerning data accuracy, but still without providing the essential user and department information. Other key drawbacks include the disturbance and cost of installing networks of special equipment around the office, as well as a high level of intrusion into staff s personal workspace. As with physical survey solutions, sensors fail to take account of remote workers who are accessing their desktop, and further inaccuracy can be introduced by a host of false and double positives, perhaps triggered by maintenance being carried out near the desk by cleaners, electricians or IT staff. RFID: The Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology that is more normally used to track production and logistics operations can also be used to track individual movements around the corporate workspace. By integrating silicon chips into existing swipe cards, a rich, accurate and realtime picture of all employee work patterns can be built up. However, this

7 methodology doesn t give information around specific desk utilisation unless card readers are located at each desk. This demands a very large capital investment at the outset, as well as a level of intrusion which is often deemed unacceptable. IP utilisation: The next generation of workspace and desktop analysis uses IP technology to quickly and accurately assess the reality of workspace usage in order to drive real, achievable and measurable real estate savings. How? Well read on. Questionnaire / interviews Physical survey Sensors RFID DeskQUERY Verifiable, objective and real-time accuracy Desk users easily identifed by name, desk or department No false positives or double positives recorded Unobtrusive in the workplace Low level of manual intervention in the workplace and at the desktop level Low level of intrusion for end-user Affordable solution working with existing technology and infrastructure no major hardware installation required Compatible with bring your own device (BYOD) strategies Excel I.T. Ltd Trafalgar House, 712 London Road, Grays, Essex RM20 3JT +44 (0)

8 Optimising desk and workspace utilisation unlocking the potential of your real estate Your infrastructure has the answers Next-generation software solutions, such as DeskQUERY by Excel, reside on your existing Local Area Network (LAN) and use existing network data to identify whether an IP device such as a PC, laptop or tablet is in use, and where it is located. The result is a quantum leap forward in terms of terms of detail, real-time accuracy and granularity of information. And because this low-intervention, unobtrusive software works on infrastructure you already have, all of these gains are delivered with no compromise on affordability. This unique approach gives accurate monitoring and analysis of real-time campus usage by identifying: Details of all IP devices on the client s network, whether directly connected, virtual, wirelessly connected or connected from outside the building. How long they are connected to the network and whether active or on standby. By combining this network data with information from other intelligent building sub-systems and databases (such as user details, the cabling infrastructure and CAD plans), the software can quickly identify under or over-utilised work areas, floors or buildings. And finally, to properly inform decision-making across local, national or global estates, DeskQUERY then communicates this information through easy-tointerpret graphical interfaces and bespoke reports. There is simply nothing more powerful or effective than seeing constantly evolving real-time usage overlaid on physical floorplans, with instant access to figures breaking down daily, weekly or monthly averages by user, department, floor, building or estate.

9 Making it happen DeskQUERY from Excel is in the vanguard of a new generation of real estate optimisation solutions that can unlock new levels of real estate efficiency and cost saving. Remember: DeskQUERY operates on your existing corporate IT infrastructures, offering significant advantages over existing hardware-based products such as desk sensors or card swipes. DeskQUERY monitors and assesses space utilisation in real time across floors, departments, buildings or group of buildings. DeskQUERY can support the most sophisticated level of spatial planning and optimisation strategies for existing locations or improve the accuracy of future expansion strategies. To see how DeskQUERY could help unlock the potential of your estates, call Excel today on or . Or visit for more information. Excel I.T. Ltd Trafalgar House, 712 London Road, Grays, Essex RM20 3JT +44 (0)

10 Get in touch Excel I.T. Ltd Trafalgar House, 712 London Road, Grays, Essex RM20 3JT