How a data-driven strategy can help you maximize office space efficiency

The honest truth is that most companies are not actively thinking about their workspaces in this manner. They are not asking themselves questions like, how can I maximize the usage of every desk and room in my office? Not yet, at least.

As a result, organizations are either struggling to fit everyone into the office or failing to attract a consistent presence there. Add to this the daily fluctuations in attendance and organizations find themselves underdelivering both in terms of workplace experience as well as workplace efficiency.

So how can companies better understand their office needs and turn their offices into finely tuned collaboration hubs? Simple: follow the data.

Utilization rate: The key metric to optimal workspace utilization

Before you begin to optimize your office space, it’s important to understand the metrics that define workspace efficiency. With that knowledge, you can then establish a system to monitor, measure, and act upon that data.

Now, every office is different, but every organization has (or should have) the same goal: put their office space to good use. But while you may view your office layout as the ideal combination of desk space, meeting rooms (of various sizes), and open collaboration areas, the only way to truly test that is by monitoring space usage. You do that by measuring utilization rate.

This enables you to monitor room usage throughout the day, whether rooms were booked or not. It also enables you to monitor meeting occupancy*, so you can understand more granular details such as the typical meeting size for particular rooms.

*During non-meeting times, all Rally cameras and Logitech Spot can detect presence, but only Rally Bar and Rally Bar Mini can count people.

In addition, with Spot and Rally Board 65 devices, you can capture data on both room health (e.g., particulate matter, CO2 Levels, temperature, humidity) and room energy (e.g., indoor and outdoor temperatures, solar radiation, ventilation). We then use these data points to generate room health and room energy scores to help you optimize in-room environments and energy efficiency.

How to monitor your data and put it to work

Capturing the right data is only one piece of the puzzle. The next step is finding a central location to store and analyze that data so you can actually make use of it. Enter Logitech Sync.

Logitech Sync provides a single repository of data for all integrated Logitech devices, helping you see exactly how every room and desk is used. This data can help you keep a close eye on utilization trends and offer the insight you need to make educated decisions on workspace optimization.

For example, Sync Insights may point out consistently high CO2 levels in a particular room. To help you balance that out (and eliminate the resulting drowsiness), Sync may recommend you increase the room’s ventilation. Similarly, Sync Insights may identify rooms that frequently run hot and offer recommendations such as dialing back the temperature on the thermostat to reduce your energy consumption.

Sync also makes it easy to integrate your utilization data with other data sources through Sync Cloud API. By commingling data sources, you can generate deeper insights into office efficiency and make the necessary changes to keep your organization running smoothly.

How can you act on utilization data to help you create a more efficient office space?

Utilization rate can tell you a lot about how your employees use your office space. But this information is only valuable if you choose to act upon it. So where do you begin? We suggest focusing on the following three areas:

Fine-tune your office design

Unused office space is one of the easiest ways to throw your money out the window. So the first and most obvious way to optimize your office space is by adapting to your specific needs. If desk usage is consistently low in certain areas, consider converting that space into an open collaboration space.

Perhaps meeting spaces are being used by individuals for client calls or one-to-one meetings more often than large team meetings. This may indicate a need to install phone pods in some lesser used space.

And if you need to make a large-scale change and downsize your office space, utilization can help you visualize what your ideal space should look like. Maybe you need fewer meeting rooms. Maybe you need meeting rooms of different sizes. Maybe you just need more flexibility.

In any case, utilization metrics can provide the blueprint you need to design (or redesign) your optimal office space.

Establish the right policies

Just because the metrics tell you you have an inefficient office space does not mean you must make any changes to the design. In fact, some of the most impactful changes you make can simply be from the policies you establish.

For example, companies that employ a hybrid work model may see peaks in desk and room utilization on certain days. By establishing a policy that states when certain teams can come into the office, you can stagger attendance to find more balanced utilization.

Maybe you notice that select days are common for large team meetings. To avoid running out of medium and large meeting rooms on those days, you can set a policy that ensures teams reach a certain attendee threshold so smaller teams aren’t boxing out the teams that really need the space. The best part is, you can monitor via sensors whether teams are abiding by this policy by showing you actual attendance figures.

Outfit your space with the right equipment

While office design and policies can help solve many of your office inefficiencies, sometimes utilization can simply be a product of spaces having (or not having) the right tools for employees to effectively do their work.

For instance, you may notice large teams frequently meeting in smaller meeting rooms when larger rooms are readily available. Maybe it’s a coincidence, but the more likely scenario is those teams want to use the digital whiteboard that only the smaller room has to offer.

Maybe you have a set number of ergonomic mice and keyboards available at certain desks that you notice are always booked. Rather than watch employees duke it out for the last mouse, you can make those mice more readily available at additional workstations.