Death of the office? In Asia, the workplace is just adapting to the Covid-19 disruption

Name: Mental health during Covid-19: ‘Be patient and kind to yourself’ as plans fall through
Uploaded: 2020-08-11T01:45:11.000Z
Duration: 5 min 42 s
Description: Mental health during Covid-19: ‘Be patient and kind to yourself’ as plans fall through

In Hong Kong, many office workers live in small spaces, which makes it more difficult to carve out working environments at home. Asia in general is more likely to rethink the workplace rather than do away with it

Reading Time:3 minutes

Why you can trust SCMP

People wearing masks sit with their laptops at The Executive Centre’s co-working space in Hong Kong. Photo: Bloomberg

Nicholas Spiro

Published: 9:45am, 11 Aug 2020Updated: 9:46am, 11 Aug 2020

To say that these are testing times for Asia’s office markets would be an understatement. In a report published last week, CBRE noted that the net take-up of office space across the region fell 45 per cent quarter on quarter in the second quarter of this year, causing leasing activity in the first half of 2020 to fall to its lowest level in a decade.

The severity of the Covid-19-induced economic shock has dealt a hammer blow to demand. Last quarter, office rents increased quarter on quarter in only two of 31 Asia-Pacific markets tracked by Cushman & Wakefield.

While the sharp rebound in economic activity in China has helped push net absorption in Tier 1 cities back into positive territory, vacancy rates in Beijing and Shanghai are close to, or slightly above, 20 per cent, driving up the average availability rate in the Asia-Pacific region to almost 15.5 per cent, data from C&W shows.

Mark Lampard, the head of tenant representation for Asia at C&W, says that “the pandemic has dealt a severe blow to corporate performance, which is echoing through real estate footprints as many [companies] seek to manage costs”.

Yet, cost containment is just one of many challenges facing occupiers as the virus unleashes a wave of disruption across the property industry on an unprecedented scale. In the office sector, the mass work-from-home experiment, coupled with the uncertainties of reopening offices while the pathogen continues to spread, is forcing companies to make difficult organisational and strategic decisions that could have a major impact on their performance.

05:42

Mental health during Covid-19: ‘Be patient and kind to yourself’ as plans fall through

High workplace density levels – the space per square foot per workstation – in the Asia-Pacific region add to the challenge of adapting to the world of social distancing. According to data from CBRE, workplace space amounts to around 80 square feet per desk, and in some cases is as low as 50 square feet. This compares with 100-150 square feet in Europe and America, suggesting that Asia is ripe for “de-densification”.

Select Voice

Choose your listening speed

Get through articles 2x faster

1.25x

250 WPM

Slow

Average

Fast

00:0000:00

1.25x