The New WFH –Working from Hoteling

As we all face the challenges of a new world under the shroud of a global pandemic, moving forward is at the top of our minds. One critical topic is how to return to the office. While there are myriad of options, a very promising method is hoteling, also known as “hot desking”. Hoteling is a system of unassigned seating in a corporation’s building, or a “co-working” space that specializes in this concept. An employee will reserve a workstation based on their current needs within their given space ahead of time, or arrive with an “open ticket”. This gives the workers options to access desking, conferencing, and amenities. Some of the largest companies in the world rely on a concierge or facility manager to maintain their hoteling workplace system to ensure their employees are productive, engaged and comfortable with whatever their duties may entail. The greatest benefits to hoteling are that this system allows a company to reduce its physical footprint by having a lower ratio of desks to employees, while promoting collaboration and movement within a space. Although it may seem as though this could be derailed with the movement to work from home, it has continued to be one of the fastest growing facility design concepts in the last several years. According to Coworking Resources, a publication serving as a resource for facility spaces, the forecast for coworking office spaces with hoteling design “is projected to reach almost 20,000 this year and cross over 40,000 by 2024. While the industry is set to grow at a slower pace in 2020, we expect growth to rebound and develop even more rapidly from 2021 onwards, with a yearly growth rate of 21.3%” (Di Risio, 2020). With these types of sharable offices being readily available, workplaces will maintain or improve their hoteling strategies to keep up with trends for employee comfort and productivity.

While co-working spaces were on the rise earlier this year, Covid-19 has created several new concerns, such as the openness of a hotel space, multiple users at single desks, and the basic idea of working in a space with large groups of people. Fortunately, the benefits out weigh the risks when proper precautions and space planning techniques are put into place.

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