The office is now a product, and landlords need to catch on

A desk, chair, an internet connection and air conditioning mean little to the nation’s work from home class. Companies who haven’t figured that out won’t bring their staff back.

Office perks can only go so far before they begin to dig too deep into the pockets of employers and landlords, and a better suggestion might be for neighbouring offices to pool funds and to provide access to speciality services in a “life support hub”.

In a not-so-distant future, that might actually be a reality with the development of precinct committees who would split the cost of hosting events, developing the spaces between offices and other perks designed to attract workers to the office.

CBRE executive managing director of property management Natalie Slessor said if such committees existed, it might end up being more cost-effective for landlords, and good ideas would likely emerge, especially if each had invested in a fund so they each had “a little bit of skin in the game”.

“I think because location is so important to the office of the future, maybe landlords could riff off their neighbours and what everyone else is doing a little bit more, they could be a bit more of a community,” she said.

“If you see a precinct like Barangaroo, they all kind of collaborate within the precinct and I wonder if you could do that more in the CBD. It could be landlords coming together with one doing cupcake Fridays and the other doing margarita Mondays. Maybe there would be a sense that as a team, we’re better together, rather than building versus building.”

Ms Slessor said she had “long held the view that the office building is a product business”.

“The first rule of product development and design is to make something people want. When you understand what the demand is, you really have to be very benefit-oriented because people won’t come to the offices because the office is there, they have to see the benefits,” she said.

Using Apple’s iPhone as an example, Ms Slessor said the US tech giant didn’t market the phone’s shape or size but its ability to put such a powerful device into a user’s hand.

The idea arrives as some landlords are footing large bills as they come up with ways to keep tenants, and in turn the employees of those businesses entertained.

Ms Slessor said she did sympathise with them as they fought to find balance between keeping tenants happy and managing shareholder returns.

“It’s not always the most easy equation to make stack up because you just give away more and more that’s free, and you’re kind of eroding your income in a sense,” she said.

“I think landlords and owners have long understood that they need amenities and there’s a kind of arms race with end of trip facilities that you have in your basement, changing spaces with free towels services and now there’s maybe a yoga room as well as fitness and wellness facilities that are put on by the landlord as a host.”

The Harbour Bridge and Sydney skyline. Picture: iStock

The average worker does not consider who the landlord of their office building is and landlords need to recognise that, she said.

“As a consumer, you don’t necessarily see those office buildings in competition on an everyday basis of course. So you really would get the benefit as a consumer coming into the city and knowing two doors down there’s a great event, and it’s been advertised in your building,” she said.

While novel perks such as themed days would soon lose their shine, landlords and employers would benefit from introducing speciality services.

“We might get a bit tired of margarita Mondays and taco Tuesdays but medical services, specialists, dentists, mental health support and other services … might be more beneficial,” she said.

“I wonder if the office could be a bit more of a kind of life support hub as well as a work support hub.”