There is clearly a common goal in both the corporate office and the higher education estate strategies, namely the desire to create spaces and places that make users happy and productive. Our work in both sectors has enabled us to identify some key themes that can and should be shared more for the good of all.

The first opportunity is around sharing experience and metrics. There are already huge datasets on educational user experience in both the US and the UK, and some are beginning to be developed in the office sector. Given that most students become workers, there’s a strong argument that this data is transplantable, and that understanding how students have learned will benefit their future employers.

Our experience in both sectors, and our wider reading, suggests that both groups of interested parties are asking much the same questions about what enables people to work to their best of their ability. Better and more wide-ranging data would improve the evidence base and make real-estate spending decisions easier to justify.

There are also some areas where the findings of corporate worker research studies could help direct higher education policies. For example, most workplace studies suggest that the length of commute has a huge impact on staff satisfaction, with the longer the commute, the more negative the effect. This would suggest that the policy shift in education to encourage students to live at home to reduce costs must be considered in terms of the potential negative impact on their overall student experience.

Another hot topic in corporate real estate is education itself. Major employers, brands and real estate developers are increasingly embracing the idea of further education as a staff perk or as an anchor for a healthy and stimulating mixed-use environment.

We expect that offering employees continuing professional or unrelated education throughout their working life will be increasingly seen as a tool to attract and retain the best talent. Specialist office providers such as Convene are emerging to facilitate the delivery of seminar, lecture and community spaces that would be instantly recognisable to every University estate director.

Surely the next step of the enlightened employer is to learn from, or possibly even joint venture with, those who have been delivering this kind of space for their core business? Might the next step for a high-performing headquarters building be to include collaboration space curated by the University of X?

Further information

Contact Savills Education