Can You Negotiate The Future Of Work Without Breaking The Office Market? A Bisnow Choose Your Own Adventure

The future of work. It’s a point of deep uncertainty, and for office owners, it can feel like they are grasping in the dark.

Office owners are having to make decisions now, decisions that might affect the future of their businesses for years to come, boost profitability or put them out of business — all with very little information about how people will choose to work in future and how they will use office real estate. The much-vaunted “return to the office” has been delayed multiple times by new variants of the coronavirus and the reality is that the world is still in the very early stages of a multi-year process of experimenting on how we will work in the months and years to come. 

The number of outcomes is almost endless. With that in mind, Bisnow has created a “choose your own adventure” to help you map out how the world of work might evolve.

So here is the scenario: You’re the owner of a 54K SF office building leased to a single tenant, a white-collar firm that straddles the worlds of professional services and tech. The building was built in 1993, and it has good bones: ample natural light, decent floor-to-ceiling heights, big floorplates, with columns all in the right places. But it has seen better days, is a bit run-down and has nothing in the way of amenities. The HVAC and insulation are old, meaning it’s not very energy-efficient. 

It is located on the edge of the central business district in a big city. It has transport links and nice restaurants and bars nearby, but they are a bit of a walk away.

Your tenant has been assiduously following government regulations, asking staff to work from home when case numbers were high, and trying to bring staff back in a safe and measured way when cases recede. 

Your occupier is planning for the future — there are two years left on its lease, and it needs to make some decisions about its future and how it will operate in a new world. 

Can you work with them to negotiate the future of work and maintain a valuable office asset? To find out, take the first step on the adventure …

One of the key factors that will affect the future of the office is how companies and their employees balance working from the office and working from home or elsewhere. What policy will the tenant in your office building decide upon and how will it make that choice?

If you think it will make staff come in five days a week, click here.

If you think it will go fully remote, click here.

If you think it will adopt a hybrid policy, click here.