Smart Workplace Solution Context
The order of magnitude for a company’s typical costs per square foot is called the 3-30-300 rule and states that, on average, companies spend $3 in utilities, $30 in rent, and $300 in payroll per square foot per year.
One of the key takeaways from this rule is that compared to energy optimization initiatives, the potential for unlocking savings through space optimization is 10 times and through boosting employee productivity is 100 times in order.
Key Workplace Efficiency Drivers
Smart Workplace Solution efficiency drivers and benefits are listed below. These help organizations achieve technology Return on Investment (ROI) and elevate employee experience, safety, and productivity.
1. Convenience to Employees and Staff
Instead of operating various services in SILO’s, employees can access different workplace services on a unified Mobile interface or a Kiosk. The Employee App eliminates the frustration of having to access different apps for different services and creates a frictionless, positive experience – improving productivity and satisfaction.
The facility staff productivity is enhanced due to anytime, anywhere data access. This usually helps clients optimize resource strength across sites while improving service levels. The provision of on-demand reports reduces the need of manual collation and documents maintenance at multiple sites. Exception-based management ensures that stakeholders get alerted only when their intervention is needed.
2. Energy Management
Automated energy monitoring helps build an energy consumption baseline which can be tracked. Occupancy-based HVAC/ Lighting control and automated scheduling can save energy by up to 10%. The trends, seasonality over the period (daily, weekly, monthly, etc.) can provide good insights to the business and help optimize energy costs. Energy goal setting and planning tools help facility teams set energy consumption goals and then track it in an intuitive manner.
Energy Performance Index (EPI) comparison to benchmark against standards as well as other facilities. This assessment throws up energy wastages, hitherto ignored. Power factor monitoring can also assess power quality and identify any inductive load that is leading to wastages.
3. Space Management
The Smart Workplace solutions are going through a paradigm shift due to the ongoing pandemic. New employee personas have emerged as detailed in the blog post here. Many companies are reviewing and consolidating their real estate portfolio to address the same.
Automation of office space is critical in these times as it can lead to optimized use of desks and meeting rooms. Flexi-seating will accommodate new employee personas like “always working from office”, “fluid or rotational staff” and “always working from home/remote” etc. that are emerging post-pandemic while providing an opportunity for oversubscription to even up to 50%.
The space utilization analytics provided provide significant insights in terms of department-wise, floor-wise, seat-wise, and zone-wise utilization. The enclosed areas can be tracked for utilization analysis against capacity. This analysis can lead to better planning, allocation, and accountability that will drive up the efficiencies.
4. Compliance with norms, regulations, benchmarks
The ongoing compliance reduces risks to property and people. Thresholds can be set for all the key parameters and warnings or alarms can be generated when the threshold is breached. E.g. Indoor Air Quality (IAQ), which is proven to affect employee productivity is important to be monitored and measured against world standards such as ASHRAE and WELL.
5. Fault Detection & Diagnostics (FDD)
FDD leads to proactive maintenance, lower failures, lesser energy & lower operational costs. Real-time tracking can avoid potentially critical situations (e.g. voltage surge) due to timely action and can increase equipment life. This means a reduction in AMC or on-site service costs, reduced downtime, and equipment replacement.
6. Centralized Command & Control
Centralized Command and Control helps integrate multi-location, multi-vendor systems, leveraging existing investments. It provides data for further analysis to improve and save costs. Centralization of operations along with the Mobile App can lead to lesser complexity, lesser resources for management while improving access to data. Standardized operator/technician interface can lead to lower expertise, centralized training, ease of inducting new staff, and ensures compliance to processes and procedures.
7. Digitization
Digital statement of record of all events, alarms, recommendations, service levels of vendors, safety & security events and actions, preventive maintenance schedules and actions, etc. Digitization simplifies audit processes, helps assign action accountability, improves risk mitigation and compliance reporting.
8. Safety and Security
Improvement in safety and security of campus and buildings is enabled through automation, mobility, compliance, alarming, notification, process automation, escalation, etc. Push notifications on employee mobile app for emergency situations help reduce risks and also provide a system of record.
9. Employee Wellness and Hygiene
Improvement in building health can be ensured through ongoing monitoring & reporting of indoor air quality and noise levels. Improved building health leads to better employee wellness and higher productivity as per various studies.
Hygiene sensors such as Odour Sensors & Wet Floor detection sensors in restrooms provide proactive alerts to ensure complete hygiene compliance.
