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For real estate directors

How much space does your organisation need at the next lease event?

A programme of requirements is often built from the number of employees, a sharing ratio (workplaces per FTE) and experience from earlier projects. Occupancy measures how the space is used, and Taxonomy plans the workspaces your activities and preferences call for, so you can substantiate the space requirement and its cost.

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From a lease date to a space requirement you can defend

Where you are

A lease event in the next 12 to 24 months

  • Renew, downsize or move?
  • A requirement built from headcount and a sharing ratio
  • Use that differs per building and floor

How the solutions work together

  1. OccupancyAnalyzeMeasures how each building is used, by observation, sensors or Wi-Fi, chosen per building.
  2. TaxonomyConfigureTurns measured use and activities into a space programme with area and cost per space type, and scenarios side by side.

What can happen

A space requirement you can defend in the boardroom

  • Renew, downsize or move compared on the same data
  • A programme of requirements a supplier can price
  • A cost estimate per scenario before you sign

Twelve months on, measure again against the baseline and the objective.

Sound familiar?

What gets in your way

  • Space requirements built from headcount and a sharing ratio
  • Occupancy data that differs per building or floor
  • Underused floors next to overcrowded ones
  • A space mix decided before your data is in
  • A space programme that is hard to defend in the boardroom

When it comes up

  • A lease event in the next 12 to 24 months
  • Moving, consolidating or expanding
  • A shift to hybrid or activity-based working
  • Rising real estate costs or a sustainability target
  • A workplace redesign in preparation

Three outcomes for real estate

  1. Measured use per building

    Occupancy measures use of the space over a representative period. With observation you also capture activities; sensors and Wi-Fi measure presence. You choose the method per building.

  2. A space programme with cost estimate

    Taxonomy plans the workspaces needed to match activities and preferences, with area allocation and a cost estimate, as input for the programme of requirements.

  3. Scenarios to compare

    Renew, downsize or move: Occupancy shows how the current space is used, and Taxonomy models the scenarios with area and cost per space type.

How it runs, from your seat

  1. A lease event, a merger, a floor that feels wrong

    Something forces the question: usually a date on a lease, occasionally a complaint that will not go away. You hear it first. The one thing worth doing in the first week is checking whether a measured baseline already exists.

  2. Establish whether anything needs to change at all

    A quick scan of current occupancy, before anyone commissions a design. Some of these projects should not happen, and finding that out in week two is cheaper than in month eight.

  3. The measurement the brief will be written from

    Occupancy gives measured use set against the benchmark, classified by activity where an observation study is used. Dynamics gives the reason behind it, by team. Together they are the evidence the brief has been missing, and the answer to 'how do you know'.

  4. A programme of requirements a supplier can price

    Taxonomy turns the measured mix into a space programme: ninety-plus space types, each with area, enclosure, equipment and cost, and a business case with scenarios. It removes the hand translation between strategy and tender that is where most briefs drift.

  5. Design against a mix that has already been costed

    Your advisor, architect and contractor lead this phase. The difference is that costing happened while the mix was still being chosen, rather than after the tender came back: the most common reason a design gets reopened.

  6. A post-occupancy evaluation that compares to something

    Twelve months on, the space is measured again against the original baseline and the stated objective. Booking keeps a live demand signal running in between, so the next lease event starts with a number instead of a search for one.

Products that fit real estate

Case

Scale-up · 1,200 employees · 700 Dynamics respondents

Stay or move

  • Assumed requirementAssumed
    13,500 m²
  • Current officeCurrent
    11,500 m²
  • Calculated requirementCalculated with Taxonomy
    10,000 m²
Taxonomy calculated the requirement from 700 respondents in Dynamics.

The recommendation

Stay and reconfigure.

The calculated requirement fits within the current office.

Calculated, without an occupancy analysis. An occupancy measurement sharpens the picture of actual use further.

What other organisations found

  • 1,200-person technology company

    Occupancy

    ~$1.2M in annual expansion costs avoided

    Proving the existing workplace had enough capacity

    Challenge
    The company was preparing to lease additional office space to support future growth.
    What we found
    Occupancy data showed how much of the existing workplace was actually being used and revealed sufficient spare capacity to accommodate the projected workforce.
    Impact
    The organization avoided the planned expansion, saving approximately $1.2M per year in additional real estate costs.

  • 1,000-person organization

    Taxonomy

    10% smaller footprint · ~$630K potential annual savings

    Designing the right workplace before a lease renewal

    Challenge
    The organization needed to define its future workplace requirements before committing to its next lease.
    What we did
    We modeled workforce needs, attendance, schedules and different space mixes to determine the right footprint and configuration.
    Impact
    The recommended plan reduced the required footprint from 14,000 m² to 12,600 m², while maintaining the required capacity and mix of spaces, reducing potential annual real estate costs by approximately $630K.

Go deeper

Discuss your lease event

A conversation of 45 minutes. You get a reply within one working day and a short written summary afterwards. Describe in your request the building, the period and the date by which you must decide.

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