Office Strategy Is Shifting From Presence to Performance

FacilitiesNet explores post-pandemic workplace recalibration, with insight from HED’s workplace design leadership on evolving expectations

Workplaces are being redefined by use patterns rather than attendance mandates

The office has entered a quieter phase of reinvention. After the urgency of pandemic response and the turbulence of return-to-work policies, attention is settling on a more durable question: what work the office actually supports, and how well it does so. Utilization, not occupancy, is becoming the more revealing metric.

Rebecca Swanner, AIA, IIDA, LEED AP, workplace sector leader from HED, contributes perspective on how organizations are reassessing space through patterns of use, team dynamics, and employee choice. “The whole point of having an office is for people to come in together and be together, and really, that’s what the office has become,” she says.

The commentary centers on aligning physical environments with how work happens now, from flexible planning to amenity strategies that support both focus and connection without overbuilding for a past model.

In FacilitiesNet, the article “How Facility Managers Can Rethink Post-Pandemic Offices” examines how facility leaders are adapting portfolios to hybrid work, shifting expectations, and operational efficiency. The piece outlines practical approaches to space optimization, employee experience, and long-term flexibility, positioning the workplace as an actively managed asset rather than a static footprint.

View the full publication here: https://www.facilitiesnet.com/commercialofficefacilities/article/How-Facility-Managers-Can-Rethink-Post-Pandemic-Offices–20858