The Big Calm: 2024 Workplace Futures Survey
After years of turbulence, the global workforce has found its rhythm as the workplace enters a new period of stability. Download the report
Now in its fifth year, Hassell’s annual Workplace Futures Survey reveals that workplace patterns are stabilising following years of disruption and upheaval. Office workers across Australia, Singapore, Hong Kong, the UK, and the US have found a sustained hybrid working rhythm defined by flexibility, freedom, and fresh air. Seeking quieter workspaces and homelike comforts, including greenery and good coffee, the 2024 workforce prefers office environments that enable quiet focus and promote productivity.
Dr Daniel Davis, Hassell Head of Research and author of The Big Calm report, believes this period of stability should come as welcome news for companies waiting for the right moment to improve their workplace.
“Companies can now implement changes with the confidence that the foreseeable future will not bring radical shifts. Updating spaces to align with workers’ new preferences will allow people to perform at their best.”
But Daniel warns that while the pandemic has had a lasting impact on flexible work, space ratios and workplace amenities, many workplaces are still adjusting to this new reality. “Meeting rooms are often fully booked, and it’s not necessarily because workers are ‘in meetings all day’,” says Daniel. “Instead, they are becoming refuges for focused work or small group collaboration, supporting needs that open-plan offices fail to meet.”
Among the report’s key findings are:
- Hybrid work has experienced a global convergence, with the number of people fully back in the office sitting between 42-50% and hybrid settling at 30-45% of all workers.
- Workers who are given the agency to choose where they work are 20% more satisfied with their workplace policy than those mandated to come in on certain days, which drops to as low as 46% among office-workers mandated to be in five days a week.
- Working from home during the pandemic adjusted people’s appreciation for what matters in a workspace. Rather than trendy amenities like a personal concierge (7%) or doggy daycare (11%), workers want simple amenities like gardens and green spaces (34%), good coffee and fresh air (33%), space to focus (27%) or even take a nap (18%) all ranking high, with free lunch and food remaining the most popular amenity (50%).
While the workplace may have reached a period of calm, challenges lie ahead that will affect workplace environments and patterns. Climate change, Artificial Intelligence (AI) and the push to reuse existing building and office spaces are beginning to impact the workplace sector and will continue to do so into the future.
Image: Earl Carter
For a copy of the full report, The Big Calm – 2024 Workplace Futures Survey, register below to access now.
