As ways of working evolve, so the roles that office buildings have to play are evolving too. Physical office environments increasingly need to become smarter: not only in terms of the ways in which they’re used, but also in terms of the workspace technology that supports them and the business done within them.
This is an area that is of particular interest to ExcelRedstone, who specialize in the design, build, optimisation and ongoing support of smart buildings. The company was established in the UK in 1987 and has grown its workforce to more than 750 employees, operating in more than 40 countries all over the world.
As part of its work, ExcelRedstone deploys a variety of technological solutions in the buildings of its business clients, meeting a range of goals, as Director Matt Salter explains:
Our services and technologies directly support the drive for improvement across any organisation. This includes leadership looking for efficiencies and improved margins, facility teams managing flexible workspaces, employees needing continuous connectivity, to security and networking teams needing to protect data integrity and physical access control.
The partnership
It’s with those goals in mind that in October 2020, ExcelRedstone joined forces with Condeco to bring workspace management solutions into its smart building projects.
Although the partnership was forged in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, ExcelRedstone’s CEO Barry Horgan said this reflected the need for businesses all over the world to respond and keep moving forward: “While there is uncertainty in the global economy, our clients are not standing still. We cannot support our clients with their ambitions if we are not ourselves ambitious.”
Through the partnership, ExcelRedstone is helping its customers adopt Condeco’s workspace scheduling solutions in order to manage a smooth, safe return to the office for their clients’ workforces. This includes not only a platform for searching and booking meeting rooms and shared workstations, but also a means to manage sanitation, reduce workspace density, control space and provide contact tracing.
“Condeco’s solutions give our customers’ employees choice and control over where they work, when they come into the office, and what spaces are safe and clean to work in. Then our in-house integration capability joins the dots between employee enablement and operational efficiency, as desk and meeting room bookings can be integrated with systems such as lighting and HVAC in order to deliver intelligent, energy-efficient workplaces.” ~ Matt Salter
The way forward
Looking ahead to the months and years to come, Salter adds that office-based work will remain a major part of business life in the long term, even if it’s no longer the only way in which people work: “We are confident that many companies will eventually return to the workplace, albeit possibly not in the same numbers as pre-COVID-19. Nevertheless, they will return and solutions such as those by Condeco will be vital to an efficient and safe workplace.”
However, Salter warns that companies embracing remote and hybrid working models must be careful not to cause ‘digital divides’, where some staff don’t have all the equipment they need to operate fully at home, and end up isolated and disconnected from their co-workers as a result: “When you have colleagues scattered all over the country, it’s really important to keep everyone connected. You can’t risk internal digital divides, and so organisations need to look at establishing partnerships with other organizations, so that they can be hands-on in supporting workers.
Companies have to ensure employees can work wherever they are, without any interruptions. So, when we take the design and build of the future workplace into account, smart technology has to be an intrinsic part of the whole process.
Discover more info on ExcelRedstone. Take a look at Condeco’s partner program for more information, and how you can become a part of the team.
