The logic is understandable. When people can workcomfortably from home, the office has to offer something more.
But what if the workplace industry has been asking the wrongquestion?
Instead of asking what else can we provide?, perhapswe should be asking what actually changes behaviour?
That question sat at the heart of a recent Woodhouseroundtable with workplace occupiers responsible for creating environmentspeople genuinely want to use. While everyone agreed that experience matters,there was far less confidence that simply adding more amenities continues todeliver better outcomes.
One participant recalled a previous employer that offeredextensive free food and snacks.
"It was like having Tesco at work. And it still wasn'tenough."
It perfectly captured a challenge facing many organisationstoday. Yesterday's differentiators quickly become today's expectations.Appreciation quietly becomes entitlement, and the baseline keeps rising.
The instinct, when attendance or engagement disappoints, is often to invest in something new. Another initiative. Another perk. Another experience.
The discussion suggested a different approach.
Great workplaces remove friction before they add experiences
Again and again, participants returned to remarkably ordinary things.
Reliable technology.
Simple booking systems.
Spaces that support concentration.
A welcoming arrival.
Feeling safe.
As one attendee put it:
"If you don't have the fundamentals right, the rest ofit doesn't matter."
The insight was striking. The most memorable workplacesaren't necessarily those with the biggest amenity budgets. They're the oneswhere the working day simply feels easier.
Hospitality, in this context, isn't about spectacle.
It's about removing friction.
Understanding people before designing workplaces
Perhaps the strongest theme to emerge wasn't about amenitiesat all.
Organisations described attendance resistance rooted incommuting anxiety, unfamiliar locations, changing routines and employees'attachment to spaces that felt like their own.
One organisation even found it needed to support peopleemotionally through a relocation before reviewing the workplace design itself.
These aren't problems another café or wellness room cansolve.
An objectively excellent workplace can still fail if itisn't responding to the reasons people value—or resist—the office in the firstplace.
Which raises an uncomfortable question.
How much of your workplace strategy is based on evidence about your people, and how much is based on assumptions?
There's another side to the story
This discussion formed just one half of our latest research.
Alongside workplace occupiers, we also brought together landlords, asset managers and property specialists to explore where investment is flowing, how expectations are changing and whether today's amenity strategies are delivering the returns the market expects.
Although the two groups approached the challenge from very different perspectives, they arrived at some remarkably similar conclusions.
Our new whitepaper, The Experience Equation, explores:
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