Role of technology in restructuring office spaces

Analysis of the office spaces over the past few years have shown an interesting trend. Though the number of new offices coming up have increased, the average size of the offices have reduced to a great extent. The new offices are shrinking taking the optimum utilization of the resources. Bangalore is the city with the largest offices in India. This is because huge IT companies and Multinational companies have their base in Bangalore. While the overall sizes of the offices in pan India saw a downfall of 12%, the offices in Bangalore shrunk by 22% as compared to last year. While the offices sizes in Delhi and Hyderabad have reduced by 20% and 53%, respectively.

•    Flexible workspaces

Many organisations are moving towards the direction of innovative workplaces. This is also to aid the today's nextgen agile workforce. The industry trends today show smaller workstations integrated with the technology that allows flexibility in sitting as well as hot desking. The agile companies today are lowering the number of seats to the floating employees and are moving towards creating more collaborative zones. This leads to optimum utilisation of the workspace and reduction of the cost. The builders in India also understand the need of the hour and are developing flexible workspaces.

•    Splitting of core and non core operations

The businesses today are splitting the core and the non-core operations by placing them at different locations. The prime office corridors involve a higher real estate cost. Besides these areas are generally very busy and have huge traffic leading to increased time in commutation. Strategic decision of splitting the business operations such as placing those operations involving public interaction at the prime location while the back end at the non-prime location helps in saving the cost to a large extent. Besides this is also beneficial for branding purpose as the company can be approached at multiple locations in the city.

•    Technology

The most vital factor that has aided in the shrinkage of offices is the technology. Automation tools are employed by most of the businesses that not only improve efficiency but also reduce the cost to a great extent. Besides, with technology the people can stay connected from any part of the world and thereby reducing the need to meet personally. Concepts like video conferencing and online meetings have greatly aided in the work from home concept. With the internet, the data can be shared with peers sitting in any corner of the world reducing the need to visit the offices daily. The best property portals in India emphasis on the technology compliant workspaces.

•    The transformative shift in the workplaces

The workplaces today are seeing a transformation. Increased emphasis is laid on the optimisation of cost and increased productivity. The firms today are shrinking the size of the cubicles or doing away from it all together. The concept of open workspaces is in the trend today. Laptops have replaced the bulky computers. Employees can work from home thereby increasing productivity by saving on the travel time.

The current trend doesn’t imply that it will continue in future also and there will be more reduction in the workspace. It, more importantly, highlights the changes that are taking place around as we move towards development and the change seen by the real estate Investment in India.