Human-Centric Design
The Physical Office is Now Just One Tool in a Broad Workplace Toolbox
September 25th, 2020The Building Process Must Begin with the End in Mind!
August 4th, 2020It Wouldn’t Be the First Time that Disease Reshaped our Built Environment
Are the open-plan office, co-working, and hotdesking all dead? Is remote working the new normal? Will our commercial real estate ever be the same again? These are the questions swirling around the buildings industry as we look ahead to the mysterious post-COVID landscape. “We are, at this moment, probably prone to overthinking a pandemic’s influence […]
The Workplace is Like a City with Distinct Zones for Each Activity
The workplace is evolving into a more human space. Alongside the technological transformation of our office buildings, new approaches to workplace design have emerged that have found the best path to productivity is to focus on the various needs of their diverse group of employees. Our cities, that have developed over decades and centuries, offer […]
The Future Workplace for an Aging Workforce
The aging workforce is an issue discussed a lot in smart building and future workplace circles. More often than not it is mentioned in the context of a demographic bulge that will quickly disappear from the workforce, leaving a big hole that must be addressed through tech-rich workplaces that will attract younger workers. This idea […]
UK Construction Policy Falls Short of Targets But Shows Significant Potential
“We’re on the edge of a revolution in how we build – one that could help us transform our society, delivering more productive public services. With new construction technology and processes, we can build better hospitals, schools, offices, and homes; and in turn, create better outcomes for everyone,” reads a recent report from international consultancy […]
Smart Buildings Offer a Scalable Foundation for Creating the Smart City
“Normally, the smart building and smart city markets seem very separated, seem far apart, and yet we have so much in common and so many things that make us similar. We believe there has been much more overlap than has been thought through in previous years and we believe we need to talk to one […]
The Living, Breathing, Thinking, Learning – Human Smart Building
The analogies between smart buildings and the human body persist reliably in industry media and analysis. While they are, in essence, nothing more than novel comparisons, they serve to help us understand the digital evolution of buildings in the cyber-physical age. By extending these analogies and recognizing their limits we can wrap our minds around […]
Integration is Key to a Smart Building’s Success or Failure
“Successful digital transformation is like a caterpillar turning into a butterfly. It’s still the same organism, but it now has superpowers,” says George Westerman, a research scientist at the MIT Center for Digital Business. When digital transformation is done wrong, however, “all you have is a really fast caterpillar,” he points out, “and it’s hard […]