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Liberated work: Responding to the unshackling of ‘work’ from ‘place’
Corporate Real Estate Journal,
11
(2),
158-172
(2022)
Abstract
The largest health crisis of our time has convincingly unshackled ‘work’ from ‘place’, but we have only seen the beginning of hybrid work solutions. In fact, our existing concept of hybrid work is simply a rudimentary stepping-stone towards a version of flexibility that is yet to be widely seen: truly liberated work. This paper seeks to explore how companies will transform their work practices to enable a liberated work environment. Knowledge workers, who are in very high demand and have suddenly become a critical customer segment for organisations, will experience no limits to their freedom of thought, behaviour or location in this new landscape. In addition, we explore how businesses can deliver a fluid workplace ecosystem, which includes a broad network of workspaces that go well beyond the binary options of working from ‘home’ or the ‘office’, and outline how every business department must contribute to creating and implementing a solution. The ramifications of this ongoing shift for corporate real estate and the broader commercial office market, which is experiencing a continuing state of flux globally, is a crucial consideration in discussions on the future of work. Delivering liberated work should be on the agenda for all organisations, large, small and government, as planning for the democratisation of work practices can ensure productivity, employee retention and improved diversity in years to come.
Keywords: hybrid work; liberated work; workplace; work practices; working from home; flexible workspace
The full article is available to subscribers to the journal.
Author's Biography
John Preece is a commercial real estate professional with a passion for tackling complex business issues in order to develop and implement workplace solutions for owners and occupiers of office space. He is fascinated by the opportunities presented for knowledge workers across the globe by the magnitude and pace of change occurring in work practices, as we progress through the stepping-stone of hybrid working, towards truly liberated working. Excited by the exponential growth in the coworking/flex space industry and noting a structural change in how businesses ‘consume’ office space, John joined Hub Australia to lead the property team in early 2018. In this role he is responsible for structuring and implementing innovative partnership arrangements with property owners for the provision of flexible workspaces and a range of common tenant amenities and hospitality services in commercial office assets; sourcing and securing new properties for Hub flex spaces; transaction management and legal negotiations; managing the refurbishment and fitout of the spaces to create amazing environments for Hub’s customers; ongoing portfolio management and enhancement; and liaising with enterprise-level customers. During his career to date John has developed a strong multidisciplinary skill set through various roles in the property industry with CBRE, DTZ, Knight Frank and Hub Australia, both in Australia and in Europe. He has held a range of senior positions across project management, occupier solutions and office leasing, as well as running Knight Frank’s multidisciplinary North Shore business in Sydney. John is a Fellow of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS), a Class 1 licensed real estate agent and a speaker at property and workplace industry events.
