The office boa constrictor

I don’t know how or why I retain random, often useless, information but it’s one of my quirks. Let’s roll with it.

So, years ago I was watching a nature programme, and some expert was telling people how a boa constrictor kills you. So we all get that it squeezes us right? But what is actually happening?

The issue is when you breath out.

When you breath out all the air leaves your lungs and they get smaller. It’s at this point the boa constrictor tightens its grips around your ribs, limiting the amount you can refill your lungs and therefore limiting how much air you can take on. And it plays the long game. Eventually your lung capacity will be so small that….well….you know the end.

I spotted this article the other day and it reminded of recent industry panel when we were debating the ‘return to the office’ where I confused everyone with my tales of boa constrictor hunting techniques.

You see, many of the industry folk in the room were saying that mandates were coming from above their pay grade. A CEO who has taken a notion and decided that ‘we work better together’ (see my previous thoughts on that here). But the problem is, there isn’t enough space.

Such was the celebration of new ways of working that property teams began work on shedding space and optimising the estate. It probably released a load budget that they could spend elsewhere and teams start posting ideas about ‘half the space, twice the experience’. Don’t get me wrong, I was probably one of the biggest cheerleaders of that idea but there’s a limit.

But what now? We were basing our assumptions on heavily reduced occupancy rates. Perhaps a slightly inflated middle of the week but nothing like the numbers we were experiencing pre-covid. We were even relaxed about making the space as efficient as possible with a move to ‘collaboration’ because that’s the only reason people would ever dream of coming to the office. Now they have been told they have to and they expect to be able to do everything in the office. Concentrate, reflect, meet (both formally and informally) and moan about mandates over the much-fabled watercooler.

I’ve got this image of the property team doing the sums and realising they need more space and then heading up to the Board, business plan in hand and……..being told there’s no budget for additional space. Now, I’ve no evidence for this whatsoever but I’ve got enough experience in the land of the corporates to imagine how this is going down.

You see the CFO was probably delighted as operational costs were rationalised and, as Nick Bloom has pointed out on numerous occasions, there hasn’t been a massive drop in output. So winner winner, chicken dinner.

Then suddenly the CEO issues the mandate but hasn’t reconciled that with the need for additional investment because they just think it’s a return to the status quo. Meaning the property just have to…….cope. Like the boa constrictor’s prey, our capacity reduced, and now we can’t expand again.

So they’ll do what they can and squeeze more desks in, repurpose unused meeting rooms, get rid of the town hall space etc. But what gives? Let me take you on a very quick detour.

There’s this thing called the ‘agency triangle’. It’s been called other things like the project triangle or the scope triangle, but it works on the basic premise that there are three key elements to a project: time, cost and quality. And they’re all linked and have to be taken into consideration when looking at a project. If you want to reduce cost that is likely to compromise on quality. You want to improve the quality then you’re likely going to have to increase cost and time. If you want something done quicker, you’re probably going to increase cost and possibly reduce quality.

There are no hard and fast rules for it but you have to be conscious of all elements when making decisions.

Back to our office problem. How do we look at our ‘mandate’ workplace challenge? Are our corporate leaders aware of all parts of the triangle? Well, the CEO wants everyone in the office, straight away (time). The CFO wants to keep the budgets where they are after the post-covid squeeze (cost). But what neither of them realise is that they’re impacting the thing they really need which is productive people. What they need to be mindful of is the experience of the space they provide (quality).

When we’re helping organisations design new surveys one of the things they seem to want to ask is how many days people want to come into the office but if there’s a mandate coming, or in place, why bother? Instead ask them questions about what you can do to improve that experience when they are in? Or even on the way in? In essence, accept that there are things out of your control and look at what you can do to mitigate the impact.

Because we’re able to get under the skin of experience with tools to unlock richer insights, you can start to hear the impact of office mandates. Perhaps you can make more spaces available in advance to book, or allow people to book multiple spaces for them or their team, or introduce an app that lets you order your coffee when you’re ten minutes so it’s piping hot when you arrive and you haven’t had to queue and spell your name (again) for the barista at your favourite coffee spot. Maybe you’ll learn that a simple shift in the times you expect people to be in the office can make a massive difference.

Who knows but I can’t see leadership teams budging on this approach and I can’t see the coffers opening, with the way of the world of the world at the moment, to start splashing the cash so for now we might have to adopt the half the space, twice the experience mantra not because it’s a strategic decision. But because it’s a necessity.

Want to look at how you could gather insight to tackle the mandate challenge? Book yourself in for a 15-minute discovery call with the team.

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