The Wall Street Journal (Feb.29, 2012) writes that “companies looking for cost savings are increasingly packing more employees into less space.” This Chapter 9 topic of office layout reflects a trend causing high commercial vacancy rates in a slowly 
recovering economy. Panasonic, for example, is moving from a 575,000 square foot campus in New Jersey to a 280,000 sq. ft. one nearby. This comes without reducing headcount, but rather reconfiguring its offices. The General Services Administration (GSA) is building a new 800,000 sq.ft. DC headquarters that will hold 6,000 employees. Its current building houses just 2,400 employees in 700,000 sq. ft.
It turns out that with workstations shrinking and private offices disappearing (replaced by more cubicles with low walls), and with more employees working remotely, employers have been gradually taking up less space for decades. Firms today take about 200 sq.ft. on average per employee, down 20% from a decade ago. And “the amount of space is continuing to shrink,” according to an industry expert.
Landlords of top space are particularly concerned about law firms, which for decades devoted large swaths of their offices to filing cabinets and libraries, as well as desks for support staff. But lawyers need fewer assistants, and technology is shrinking, or making obsolete, the need for paper storage. San Diego law firm Robbins Geller Rudman & Dowd just contracted its space by 20%, to 114,000 sq.ft.,while adding more lawyers.
Discussion questions:
1. Is there a similar trend to reduce operations space in manufacturing?
2. What other benefits accrue from shrinking office space per employee?
I think as long as employees are happy that their needs are catered for in the space they have, it’s not a problem for space to be shrinking. A lot of people welcome flexible working and it benefits businesses and employees alike.