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- [00:12]
Andrew Tuck
Hello and welcome to the Urbanist Monocles program all about the built environment. I'm your host, Andrew Tuck.
- [00:18]
Sue Asprey Price
Coming up, how do you find that optimal for an individual? How do you allow them to have access to an office but at the same time have a flexibility to be enabling them to feel that they're not tied to that desk?
- [00:31]
Andrew Tuck
How are office spaces adjusting as the struggles of the past five years start to fade in the rear view mirror? We hear from the real estate services company JLL to find out what their recent workforce preference barometer tells us about office use and how attitudes are continuing to shift. Then our correspondent in Washington D.C. reports on the challenges that militaries face when training for combat in urban environments. That's all ahead in the next 30 minutes right here on the Urbanist with me, Andrew Tuck. Global real estate services company JLL recently published its Workforce Preference Barometer 2025, looking at how workers currently feel about being at their desks and the role companies have in creating better spaces for all. It's a topic we cover a lot on the program, but one that is existentially important for the future of our cities. I was lucky enough to be joined in the studio recently by JLL's CEO of Work Dynamics for Europe and the Middle east and Africa, Sue Asprey Price. We discussed everything from the future of office life to building in flexibility in how design, management and culture can make people fall in love with the office all over again. I began by asking if the findings in the workforce Preference barometer showed the outlook for our cities was, well, generally positive.
- [01:59]
Sue Asprey Price
I'd say that it is. It's positive, but it's a little bit multidimensional. And what we're seeing more and more now is that the sentiment to return to the office is returning. So I think in the last few years, obviously in a post Covid era, there was a tendency of wanting to stay in an environment where they stayed at home. But now we're starting to see that sentiment of return to the office. So the barometer across the various age categories is shifting. And the one area that I'm really positive about is that the gen zers, as we call them, all of a sudden are saying, actually there's real value in being back in the office and we're recognizing the learning opportunity, the social opportunity, and the fact that it's helping us from a career development perspective. So we're really seeing a change in that space.
- [02:47]
Andrew Tuck
It comes with quite a few caveats, though. One of them is it puts a huge amount of pressure on especially big corporate employers to think what they're doing and respond to various and different needs across the generations as well. One of the things is a hard to nail down topic, work life balance. And this is something that people bring up with you in the survey. What is that exactly? And how should employers begin to respond to that when it comes up as a question?
- [03:14]
Sue Asprey Price
Yeah, and I think this goes back to the term of hybrid, right? That again, more and more we're seeing an increased sentiment of wanting to be in the office, but not all the time. We call it the kind of hybrid balance in our narrative where over 80% of our respondents are saying they see the value of office, but they don't want to be there five days a week. So when we talk about work life balance, it is what is the number of days or number of hours or functions that people do see a value in being in the office, but they also see a value of having time where they work remotely. And I'm not even going to use the term work from home because in some cases it's just being in close proximity for them to do things with friends or to do things with their own personal life where they say, I don't want to be tied to a desk in a specific office location for five days a week. So I think a lot of the multidimensional part of it is how do you find that optimal for an individual? How do you allow them to have access to an office, but at the same time have a flexibility to be enabling them to feel that they're not tied to that desk? You know, you said it. It's very difficult for employers of how do they get that jigsaw, right? How do they know? Do they have enough space? Do they have enough of the right space? And in particular, are they attracting the talent by giving them that balance? And that's a tough thing to judge, right? Gone are the days of where it was formulaic. We have this number of employees, they're going to be in office five days a week. They each need a desk, they each need this amount of meeting rooms. That modularity is thrown up in the air right now.
- [04:55]
Andrew Tuck
And we should be clear that again, in the range of corporate players, if you're working for maybe one of the US Investment banks, for example, or you're working for one of the big law firms or maybe for an AI startup, they're not going to give you that option. They're not going to say, why don't you come in a couple of days a week, we can work around your needs. But in the middle there are these companies where it's a little bit more competitive, perhaps because there are more people trying to get into that world. But again, there you identify something which I thought was interesting about the compliance and that happens around coming in on the agreed days that you're flexing on that actually some people are more compliant than others, often to do with seniority or to do with age or maybe family situations. Again, does that make it difficult for a company to respond in a, in a universal way when you have these differentiators?
- [05:44]
Sue Asprey Price
Yeah. And I think the change that we've seen, Andrew, is more and more companies are mandating. So in our survey it's about 48% of organizations across Europe are now actually saying you have to be in the office for X number of days per week. And that user group that you talked about, some of the investment banks, some of the law firms are saying there are functions that we need to see happen in an office. We're not seeing people kind of naturally gravitate to that. So we're going to put a mandate in place. So that's point number one, that we are seeing a hardening of mandates that then even if they say we want people in the office three days a week also adds complexity where people are then like, well which three days do I need to be in? Do you want me there when my team is in? Do you want me there when we've got big functions? So there's still a bit of self policing, so to speak, even when they mandate the number of days, unless they flat out say it's five days a week, which very few have come out and said it's absolutely five days a week. So we're still seeing that settling in of that kind of self regulation of what does that mean in terms of number of days a week in the office? And you're right, some startups, some others are saying actually we're going to give you that flexibility and still trust you that you will come into the office as and when you feel that you need to. And that's a bit of a talent attraction opportunity for them in some cases as well. And I would say that's for certain roles where a level of flexibility is still very attractive. So I'll cut to the chase. Things like some coding, engineering roles, actually performance in a self home environment, the performance is still very, very high because you need focus time, you need focus space and being in a distracted office can sometimes have. So having a degree of perceived very flexible environment where you get to self regulate. For certain companies, that's still an opportunity for them to attract talent.
- [07:43]
Andrew Tuck
When I mandate somebody coming back to my office or I ask them to come back to my office, it's not that they don't have an option potentially to go somewhere else. So what then keeps them in the office? What makes a good office to return to and what makes an office where people think, okay, I need to start job hunting?
- [07:58]
Sue Asprey Price
Yeah, it's a really good question because what we've also seen is that a lot of those occupiers, especially those are really pushing and mandating it, are spending a lot of capital on their offices and getting that mix. Right. Right. It's creating an environment that is just a pleasant environment and that can mean many things. Some of it is having the right work environment, some of it is having the right amenities within a building. Right. That the food offering that the coffee, the kind of competing with the home that they have doubled and really made these environments be not only functional but pleasant environments to be in. And a lot of the work that we do with our clients is now focused around the human experience as opposed to just the functionality of what real estate is. So really spending time on almost looking at the Personas of individuals to say what is going to make this really appealing for them. And some of that is simple things like you've got to have a good coffee offering and food environment that people think actually this is really good. My employer is investing in me and they're giving me choice and offers others is just, you know, again having work environments where it's not just a sea of white desks, open plan that there are breakout spaces where people can have quiet time and focused time and other areas where they might just want to be in a more collaborative environment that there's environments that allow them to be able to do that. So the companies that are mandating and again I would say none of them are not, a lot of them are five days a week. A lot of them are around the three day a week. I think it's just over 50% are saying we'd like to have you in three days a week. The upside is they're investing in that space and that experience. So those three days a week feel like a good experience for those employees.
- [09:49]
Andrew Tuck
We get to go see lots of people in their HQs and luckily we own a coffee shop. So I don't worry about that one. But it's amazing how many people have an in house barista now. Even smaller companies how many spaces seem to have borrowed from the world of not just domestic interior design, but hotel design. You feel often even in a workspace environment, there's so many sofas, it's slight lobby, picking up maybe on the vibe that some people had when they were working in remote spaces and third spaces. I know you're not here as a design consultant today, but is that important that we learn lessons from other players in a way to bring in a little bit of the hospitality experience?
- [10:26]
Sue Asprey Price
It's huge. It's a great question. And actually, again, when I talk about some of the dollars that are being spent in that human experience, it's a lot of learnings from the hotel industry of creating that look and feel and experience that you have little things like. A lot of our clients actually push smells into their environments. I've walked into a number of offices and there's a very pleasant green tea smell. And they're doing that on purpose because, again, it's calming, it's familiar, it's not, oh, my gosh, I'm walking into a stuffy office. There's also, like you say, this hospitality, how people are greeted in an environment, how their needs are taken care of. Things like biophilia, plants. You know, you probably remember this, Andrew, as I do. Fifteen years ago, you'd walk into an office and you might have a few plants in the front lobby. Exactly. Now they're creating environments to your point, where there's a sofa with a plant and a relaxed environment, that people can have a conversation, that they feel really comfortable in that space. They don't feel like they're having to sit up and think, I'm in a hard desk chair here. This is actually a created environment for me to have a more relaxed, engaging conversation. That is still a business conversation, but it's an environment that's encouraging that type of interaction. And that's all come from the design, and you said it, the hotel industry, there's a lot of lessons being learned from that.
- [11:51]
Andrew Tuck
Right now, I wonder, is there a point sometimes when you're meeting with clients that their eyes roll a little? Because we're speaking on a day when Sir Charlie Mayfield, who used to head up the John Lewis organization here in the uk, has just brought out a report on what's happening with working Britain. We have a situation where 20% of people are not in work and not looking for work. They're inactive. Some of that is, again, connected with what happened during the pandemic. People dented emotionally and in confidence in all sorts of ways. And some people obviously not that keen on the strictures of work because they don't see what it delivers for them with low pay and all sorts of situations. There's lots of things you can do, but is there even when you're speaking to clients, you have to accept that there's some people who, no matter how nice the coffee is, there are some things you can't deliver as an employer.
- [12:40]
Sue Asprey Price
Yeah, I think some of that is around to your point. Confidence of people and giving them a bit of a purpose. And I would say that a lot of companies are trying to relate to their employees or talent that they want to attract around a purpose. So that has not gone away. And if anything, again, how a physical office environment allows them to do that or enables them to do that is something that we are seeing. So you think about sustainability as an example and how are companies positioning that, but also reflecting that in their physical office environment. That's just one example. The other thing that some of the report said was also around, whether it be mental illness or physical illness and how can a employer office environment really think about employee well being? And you look at some of the programs that employers offer both for physical, you know, environments and gyms, or endorsement of actually if you physically get yourself well, you have a different approach and a different mentality and then mental wellness as well. You know, again, I look at how great and evolved design of spaces has. We design spaces for neurodiverse candidates that in a pre Covid world their needs may not have been considered. Things like lighting, things like colors on the wall and everything that calms them mentally. So a little bit of this kind of support of mental well being, supportive physical well being is actually something that we can really use and that employers could be promoting a bit more that that's helping those inactive individuals. And actually we're here to support you to become part of the workforce. And don't underestimate that feeling of personalization for those individuals to get them a bit more active. But it's a challenge. I'm not suggesting that a design of an office or a physical space can help solve it, but it's certainly part of the equation to solve it.
- [14:39]
Andrew Tuck
And now you can correct me here, But I believe JLL is in some 80 roughly markets around the world. You're not a small player, you're one of those companies that maybe the public don't bump into every day. But when you look at the vast number of buildings that you're connected with and investments, you're one of the key global property players anchored out of Chicago. Yes, I Take it that there are quite a few towers in your portfolio. Is that a complexity now that I'm sure if you said to every employer, where would you like to work? That it would be like some nice cool warehouse in a hip neighbourhood. But that's not possible with the scale of employment we're talking about here. So what are the challenges about bringing people back to the high rise, to working on the 30th floor, for example?
- [15:18]
Sue Asprey Price
Yeah, I think we've got some tremendous examples here in London which are what we call vertical campuses. Right. You think about the Shard as an example is a very good example of a vertical campus where yes, you might be in a big tower, but actually you go to level 30 and there's an amazing restaurant offering, you go to level 22 and there's an incredible gym that has a Spa. Level 10 is an amazing coffee shop. So you think about when an employer wants to really double down on getting their employees in and attracting talent, they look at the mix of all those different amenities. And if in a big tall tower you can break up that space and make sure that those offerings are known and are very accessible, you can actually create a big campus. And you think about some of the big global occupiers that we service in parts of the US as an example, where space is not as much of a challenge. They've worked hard at curating multiple building campuses which have those amenities in the middle. So with big high rise towers, you need to really think about that amenitization and ensure that that's on offer. Now one of the challenges we're seeing with the marketplace is of course that costs money to do it. And the assets that have adopted some of that are frankly the best performing assets in the sense that they are full, they've got tenants within them, they get rated very highly by employees and there is a payback for it. But obviously then there's a cost up front to do it. So right now we've got what we call a bit of a bifurcated market where the buildings that are highly amenitized, whether it be a high rise or not, are in high demand. And those that, that haven't done it and haven't put the investment dollars in, are struggling a bit right now in terms of vacancy and securing the rents that would normally be paid for those type of assets.
- [17:20]
Andrew Tuck
Because we've traditionally thought that the US had been a bit slower to return to the office, but actually the US is ahead of the game. If you look, I don't want you to rank your 80 markets. But if you look at the top of the market, which regions, when you hear about what they're doing, are doing well. You said London is a good player but the US would be another one then.
- [17:36]
Sue Asprey Price
Well, I'd caveat that not all parts of the US Right. And again, you look at big hu, you look at New York. I don't know Andrew, if you've been to Manhattan recently, but it's busy and you know, everybody's kind of coming back to the office. I think that's a combination of some of the big banking employers that have been a bit more strict on mandating attendance into the office. And again, financial services firms I referenced earlier that about 50% of firms had mandated people coming back in the office. On the financial services side, that's more like 70 of them have said, actually we're office based cultures, we need you to come in. So New York is very busy, Chicago is very busy right now. Parts of the west coast, you know, again you look at the big tech firms I was out recently and in around Menlo park, around San Francisco, those are busy campuses. Again, there's some parts that still have not got the full breadth of having people return. So I'd say that it's probably varied depending on the city and also depending on the profile of the occupiers in those cities, the dominant occupiers.
- [18:41]
Andrew Tuck
And so tell me, have you had to take some of your own medicine for jll? Have you had to think you must feel almost like the test kitchen for. Cause your clients come into your spaces and it's quite hard to tell people what to do if you're doing it yourself. Do you have a few baristas in your building?
- [18:56]
Sue Asprey Price
Oh, we certainly do. And we joke all the time that, you know, our offices have to be exceptional because we are the showcase of what offices can be. And we're almost. You're right. We're the test lab of if we put these pieces together, how do we make that be an attractive environment? We've spent some dollars on some environments, but you can't have a magic wand and do that everywhere. But again, where we have spent that things like our Singapore office we invested in a few years ago and we've had fantastic response. We're actually moving in London. We're going to be moving into our new building in 2026 and we're really looking forward to it. But we've been very thoughtful around that being the showcase. But you're also right, we are a company that, that owns offices through our LaSalle group, we also advise clients on how they get people back to the office. And we've been highly promoting people to be in the office. You know, I'm in pretty much five days a week now. That's not always the same office. I'm often in other offices across the world. But I'm one of those people. I love it. I get such an energy buzz from being in the office and being able to speak to people quickly or to get into the lift and have that five minute convers that a few years ago would have been a half hour zoom meeting. I love it. So I'm one of those people that gets the energy and if you're of that type, actually being in an office, it inspires you rather than feels like a hindrance. So we have some of those people.
- [20:27]
Andrew Tuck
I'm one of them too. I wouldn't want to be doing this on a zoom call between our various offices. Okay, before I let you go, so I'm a potential client. I've come to see you. I have a building that needs to be changed. I want to get my team excited about coming back to the office or just being in the office and liking the space. Just give me a little rundown of things that you would send me away to do my homework on. What are three or four things that I should think of before I start pumping millions of pounds into my own new project?
- [20:54]
Sue Asprey Price
Yeah, great question. And I do think it is having a bit of a, first and foremost an open mind, right? Listen to the generational workforce that you need to be accommodating. So with some companies, that's a more aging population all the way down to the gen zers. And with others it's your trying to attract a certain profile of talent and just understand what drives them, what they like. And there's a lot of research out there and you can use some great data to just give you that perspective and the profile of what's attractive to those individuals. You then have to do the jigsaw puzzle of getting those right in that environment so that the dollars that you're spending are wise dollars spent. The second thing is have an open mind, right? We've got some tremendous Flex providers out there. Flex is coming back where a company may not be where they want to make a full commitment to a big chunk of space and put a lot of dollars into it. You can have startup companies and you can also have bigger companies that are using Flex as a bit of an experiment to say what about this environment is attractive? So don't underestimate the opportunity of using the lab before you actually go and spend your dollars. So there's a lot of options out there that you can do that in. And then the third thing is again, don't underestimate amenities. Experience. Gone are the days of a stuffy office where you walk in the front door and you might eat your lunch at your desk and you don't get anything else and you leave. Right? Think about environments, experience all of those food offerings. I'll say it again, those are really important ingredients. And don't underspend on those.
- [22:36]
Andrew Tuck
Sue Asprey, Pricer, JLL's CEO of Work Dynamics for Europe, the Middle east, east and Africa too, The presence of soldiers on the streets of cities in the United States has been an all too familiar sight in recent months. Beyond the political posturing going on, though, this urban boots on the ground experience is rare for a military so how do troops train for urban combat? Monocle's Washington D.C. correspondent Charlotte MacDonald Gibson sent us this report on the challenges faced when training for battle in city environments.
- [23:16]
Charlotte MacDonald Gibson
It was an unusual suggestion made by President Donald Trump last month as he addressed the country's most senior military leaders at Quantico Marine Corps base in Virginia. Training for urban warfare is notoriously tricky, given that under normal circumstances, novice soldiers can't march around bustling cities fully armed, practicing complex and risky manoeuvres whilst surrounded by civilians. But that is exactly what Trump appeared to be suggesting as he pontificated on his recent deployments of the National Guard to Democrat run cities including Los Angeles and Washington.
- [23:49]
Sue Asprey Price
But I want to salute every service member who has helped us carry out this critical mission. It's really a very important mission, and.
- [23:56]
Lt. Col. Michael Breslin
I told Pete we should use some.
- [23:58]
Sue Asprey Price
Of these dangerous cities as training grounds for our military National Guard. But military?
- [24:04]
Charlotte MacDonald Gibson
The suggestion that US troops train in domestic cities understandably provoked outcry, but it does highlight a persistent problem facing militaries around the world. Most countries have plenty of options for training for open warfare, much less so for urban combat, even as global urbanisation means that those environments are the most likely future battlefields. The irony, however, was that Trump was speaking just a few kilometres away from three dedicated urban warfare training facilities on the Quantico base. The largest mocked up city is known as Mount Town, getting its name from the acronym for Military Operations in Urban Terrain. It dates to the Cold War and its low rise buildings on narrow streets were designed to resemble a European city. For decades, new U.S. marines have been put through their paces at the decidedly lo Fi Mount Town. Even as the design, architecture and technology of modern cities has changed dramatic. Lt. Col. Michael Breslin, War fighting director at Quantico's Basic School, said there is still great value in the exercises they do here. Given that the fundamentals of urban warfare can be applied in different theaters, not.
- [25:11]
Lt. Col. Michael Breslin
All urban areas, urban corridors look the same. There's really very few that represent a mega urban complex anywhere on a Marine Corps base. But if we can get them to understand on a micro level, how do we apply what we learn against a larger problem set, then that's a win. Entering a building is still entering a building, whether it is a mud building or the brick structures that I saw in Iraq, or if you're in a shanty town made largely of corrugated metal, you would still need to apply the same mindset and the same techniques to get through that.
- [25:43]
Charlotte MacDonald Gibson
And these days, Mount Town is getting plenty of action as the Marines pivot for a new age of technological warfare where the urban environment plays an increasingly central role.
- [25:52]
Lt. Col. Michael Breslin
I would say that as humans begin to cluster towards urban centers, that is where conflict will likely occur. So that isn't to say that's only where it will occur. You can look at parts of the world right now where that's not true, but Ukraine as an example, has had urban conflict and what looks like traditional World War I trench line conflict. We have to be able to operate in both.
- [26:13]
Charlotte MacDonald Gibson
During the 29 week training program at the basic school, the men and women selected as Marine Corps officers get the fundamental grounding to lead their riflemen into battle, covering weapons training, martial arts, arduous hikes, land navigation and tactical planning. The training culminates in an urban warfare attack scenario where they consolidate their learning in a real world environment, says company commander Captain Micah Thomas.
- [26:35]
Lt. Col. Michael Breslin
What we consider advanced a little bit is the urban environment, just because, you know, looking at structures and buildings, the 3D environment, different windows, doors, angles, everything. So we consider this advanced for them, so they're going through at the platoon level and really attacking their peers, which are their adversary, going through a lane with several buildings and that to clear them and then seize an objective that they've been tasked with.
- [27:00]
Charlotte MacDonald Gibson
The trainers stress that the instruction at the urban training facilities at Quantico is the first step in a Marine's journey and they will go on to other advanced training elsewhere. The most sophisticated urban warfare training facility in the US is the muscatatuck Urban Training Centre in India, a sprawling former mental institution that now consists of 300 structures, over 100 acres and includes a cave complex, a reservoir and mock ups of different geographical urban environments including a shanty town and a roundabout. And the US is not the only military developing new training grounds for urban warfare. In March this year, Singapore officially began training at Safdi City. Billed as the most technologically advanced urban training facility in the world, it is designed to simulate a densely populated modern City and includes 12 story office towers among its 72 buildings, many interconnected and with subterranean elements. It has a mocked up light rail system and storm drains and 11,000 sensors which provide real time feedback such as counter fire. Then there are advances in artificial intelligence and virtual and augmented reality which give soldiers an increasingly realistic experience of urban warfare without having to worry about any civilians wandering into harm's way. The new synthetic training environments now integrate artificial and augmented reality, AI and haptic technology which mimics tactile sensation so that scenarios are responsive to the soldiers actions in real time, creating immersive and realistic training environments which would be impossible to undertake in a real city. There are also virtual reality copies of cities in north and South Korea as well as American cities such as New York and San Francisco, meaning that Trump's dream of having troops train in Democrat run cities is already happening in the metaverse, if not real life. But for all the virtual developments, these digital simulations can never replace live training. So even though it's looking a little dated, Mount Town will likely continue to be stormed by enthusiastic new Marines for many years to come.
- [29:01]
Andrew Tuck
My thanks to Charlotte MacDonald Gibson for that report. And that's all for this week's episode of the Urbanist. You can follow us for new editions of the show every week and you can subscribe to Monocle magazine for reports on all things design, architecture and good urbanism too. Just head over to monocle.com the Urbanist is produced by Carlo Trabello and by David Stephen Stevens, who also edits this show. I'm Andrew Tuck. Goodbye and thank you for listening, city lovers.