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How to make hot-desking work
Cost savings are not the way to go about it
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Personalised territory seems to be correlated with a sense of belonging.
PHOTO ILLUSTRATION: UNSPLASH
The Economist
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The highest private terrace in Manhattan belongs to an algorithmic-trading company called Hudson River Trading. Its offices, spread across several floors near the top of Three World Trade Centre, are more theme park than workplace: a games room, gym, dining areas, stupefying views, happy hours and drawers unexpectedly stuffed full of sweets to give employees a surprise. You come away wishing you had concentrated more in maths at school.
You also come away wondering about one of the silver linings of the post-pandemic office for bosses who dislike the idea of home-working. If fewer people are coming in on any one day, at least they don’t need as much space: They can find unassigned desks and the firm can save some money. The trouble is that hot-desking flies in the face of two things, one deeply embedded in the human psyche and the other a direct consequence of the pandemic.
