University
A University needed to relook at their administration space allocation to reduce square footage and standardize on space and stuff.
I collaborated with the team to conduct research and came up with strategies to uniformly create allocated square footages based on on-site work, remote work, and rightsizing shared resources.
Scope
I was part of a team to analyze the administration’s building footprint as they sat over 8 buildings. Our team took over a previous consultant’s initial work. Our team picked up with the following activities
Focus group with Department Leadership, Department Managers, Department Staff
Analyze online survey results (initiated by previous consultant)
Analyze space digital monitoring devices in shared meeting spaces and departments (locations initiated by client prior to engagement)
Analyze of existing square footage throughout administration neighborhood
Analyze existing delegation of shared spaces throughout administration neighborhood
Research peer institutions and private organizations on flexible and hybrid work in regard to square footage allocation
Collaborate with client on delegating square footage allotments to redefined flexible/hybrid work schedules
Research
Existing SF Distribution
Existing plans were evaluated for square footage allotment as well as space types.
We could see how different space types were being allocated, specifically the ME versus WE space.
Allocating personal space with shared spaces became one of the main driving factors in future space allotment.
Staff Input
To understand the work being performed in each department and the culture, all departments were interviewed.
To allow for open dialogue, the focus groups were separated into Leadership, Department Heads, and Staff groups.
One exercise allowed staff to indicate how they would want to work, from a single assigned seat to an open non-assigned seat. This was one of the crucial items to better understand space allocation.
Peer and Industry Research
Research was gathered from other peer universities for their use of space allocation
as well as the private sector. Understanding your competition in the private and peer sectors provide assurance of alignment.
Allocating Workseat Square Footage
And when we had the survey responses of what staff preferred, their contracted number of days in the office, and their supervisors preferred number of days in the office, the team collaborated on how to create more uniform flexible/hybrid work schedules.
Now that we know how much space is being underutilized, how do we create new standards for how much staff is in the office? Can that workstation or private office square footage be reduced?
Can that square footage be better utilized when that person isn’t in the office?
If a staff member is in the office more, they should receive a more permanent seat and possibly more square footage to do their work.
If a person works remote more often, then let’s use that space when they aren’t onsite to share the work seat,
provide it as a huddle room or reduce the square footage since they are keeping less stuff at the office.
Creating New Standards
So, let’s redefine how shared spaces are allocated.
Frist, let’s ensure we have the right size of conference rooms per the usage we found during the monitoring phase.
Second, let’s distribute less used spaces over the entire campus.
Then distribute spaces over the building
Then distribute spaces per division.
Distribution of meeting spaces ensure that larger rooms are available to all and using less square footage per division, and that smaller meeting spaces are used more in the divisions.
Emerging Recommendations
Through the various phases, we understood what items needed to be addressed to provide a lesser square footage footprint while allowing a better use of space.
Still in progress…
The project is still in progress.