How can facilities management benefit from offices becoming more user-centred?

Abstract

Purpose

This study aims to explore an emerging collection of smart building technologies, known as smart workplace solutions (SWS), in the context of facilities management (FM).

Design/methodology/approach

This study is based on semi-structured interviews with facility managers in Finland, Norway and Sweden who have deployed SWSs in their organizations. SWS features, based on empirical data from a previous study, were also used to further analyse the interviews.

Findings

It analyses the benefits that SWSs bring from the facility management point of view. It is clear that the impetus for change and for deploying SWS in the context of FM is primarily driven by cost savings related to reductions in office space.

Research limitations/implications

This research has been conducted with a focus on office buildings only. However, other building types can learn from the benefits that facility managers receive in the area of user-centred smart buildings.

Practical implications

SWSs are often seen as employee experience solutions that are only related to “soft” elements such as collaboration, innovation and learning. Understanding the FM business case can help make a more practical case for their deployment.

Originality/value

SWSs are an emerging area, and this study has collected data from facility managers who use them daily.

Citation

Einola, K.A., Remes, L. and Dooley, K. (2024), "How can facilities management benefit from offices becoming more user-centred?", Facilities, Vol. 42 No. 15/16, pp. 17-29. https://doi.org/10.1108/F-01-2023-0003

1. Introduction

Facility management’s (FM) importance has been increasingly acknowledged in recent years (Nota et al., 2021), especially in this post-COVID era when hybrid work has become a new norm in office buildings and increasing attention has been paid to indoor environment conditions (Babapour, 2019; Chua et al., 2022; Gocer et al., 2022; Juchnowicz and Kinowska, 2021; Leesman, 2023; Vyas, 2022). Furthermore, flexible work, activity-based working (ABW) and hot-desking have created additional challenges for FM, especially considering space usage and occupancy rates (Chua et al., 2022; Dooley, 2018; Shifrin and Michel, 2022; Vyas, 2022). Failing to implement these new ways of working might cause dissatisfaction among the occupants (Marzban, et al., 2022). The new trends are making intelligent and data-driven management practices central in FM (Kinowska and Sienkiewicz, 2022).

FM’s mission is to create a work environment that promotes occupant well-being and productivity (IFMA, 2022; Kinowska and Sienkiewicz, 2022; van Sprang and Drion, 2020). To meet the needs of today, FM must consider digitalization, IoT, smart technologies, smartphone or desktop applications and their development (Bröchner et al., 2019; Cooper et al., 2017; Fairchild, 2019; Gocer et al., 2022; Kinowska and Sienkiewicz, 2022; Marson and McAllister, 2021; Nota et al., 2021; Sarkar, 2021; Tuzcuoğlu et al., 2022; Vigren et al., 2022).

The many different technologies available create an opportunity for employees and a responsibility for the FM to choose the best solutions for their business (Fairchild, 2019; Zhou et al., 2022). High-quality FM is up-to-date and uses these new technologies to improve office buildings to best serve occupants’ needs. Their actions can help, even in a minor way, to reduce friction in the workplace, save time and make work life more convenient and efficient for the employees (Fairchild, 2019; Kinowska and Sienkiewicz, 2022; Remes et al., 2022; Ruohomäki et al., 2015; Tuzcuoğlu et al., 2022; Vigren et al., 2022). It has been noted that employees’ satisfaction with the workplace affects their productivity (Groen et al., 2019; Nguyen et al., 2022), which in turn influences the company’s financial success (Nguyen et al., 2022). Therefore, user-centredness should be a key driver when managing workplaces. While FM may not be primarily responsible for driving user-centredness in a workplace, they could benefit from an increased focus in this area. Following the European smart readiness indicator’s (SRI) definition of user-centredness, it comprises four attributes: comfort, health and well-being, convenience and information to occupants (ItO) (Verbeke et al., 2020). Most of the research has focused on the first two attributes, neglecting the attributes aiming to make users’ lives easier and save their time (Remes et al., 2022).

One of the key solutions to make offices more user-centred are smart workplace solutions (SWSs), which were introduced, named and their key features defined by Remes et al. (2022). They categorized the features of SWSs based on their occurrence in the solutions, as presented in Table 1 below. Those based on Remes et al. (2022) data are listed here only based on their relevance to this study. The supporting components of the SWSs are usually combinations of Internet of Things (IoT) presence sensors, IoT indoor environmental quality (IEQ) sensors, IoT gateways, cloud data storage and integrations with software such as Microsoft Office 365 and Google Workspace. This is important as they are the key components for creating user-centred elements in workplaces, which use the user data to create buildings that are more ecological, economical and user-friendly (Bröchner et al., 2019; Chua et al., 2022; Cooper et al., 2017; Fairchild, 2019; Gocer et al., 2022; Kinowska and Sienkiewicz, 2022; Marson and McAllister, 2021; Nota et al., 2021; Sarkar, 2021; Tuzcuoğlu et al., 2022; Vigren et al., 2022).

The previous approach to smart buildings focused on ensuring that the building systems work correctly by making sure there is adequate lighting and good air quality (Remes et al., 2022). However, the concept of making users’ lives easier in the building has not been studied sufficiently. Modern activity-based offices are complex systems where everyone must know the rules of using the space, for example, if an area is for quiet work or collaboration (Lai et al., 2021). Moreover, hot desks create additional challenges as people might not know which desks are available (Cooper et al., 2017). From the SWS perspective, making life easier in offices can mean, for example, wayfinding and seeing the availability of spaces in real time and their designated purpose.

The motivation for this study was to learn which SWS features are relevant to FM and for what reasons. The approach is relevant because FM can play a role in selecting them; thus, understanding the benefits of FM can help shape these emerging solutions. This study provides guidelines for developers and offers valuable information for FM customers relating to which SWSs are the best based on their organizational needs.

We asked: which of the SWS features are the most relevant from the FM viewpoint, and why? The hypothesis was that the SWS features associated with space use are considered the most important because of the financial rewards of optimizing the utilization rate of the premises. The significance of that has only been further emphasized after the COVID-19 pandemic, as hybrid work has become a new norm for office workers, which reduces the need for the use of large offices (Bloom et al., 2022; Chua et al., 2022; Marzban et al., 2022). Under-used offices produce unnecessary costs related to rent, energy and other operating expenses such as cleaning (Jayantha and Oladinrin, 2019). Furthermore, space reduction and digitalization are important from an environmental impact viewpoint (Bröchner et al., 2019; Habibi, 2017; Kaur and Solomon, 2021; Nazeer et al., 2020).

2. Methodology

This study used a mixed-methods approach by combining qualitative and quantitative data to analyse the interviews. Semi-structured interviews with facility managers were conducted to determine which SWS features they appreciated and why. Moreover, Remes et al.’s (2022) quantitative data about the most frequent SWS features was used as a framework to analyse the interviews. In addition, findings from the literature were used to evaluate the results.

2.1 Participants

The interviewees were selected based on their knowledge of the subject, and they were users of either Rapal’s (part of EG) Optimaze Worksense (OW) or Haltian’s emphatic building (EB) end-user applications. Eight FMs from seven organizations were interviewed (see Table 2). They were based in Finland, Norway and Sweden. The organizations were from three sectors: technology, consulting and finance or insurance. The interviewees were recruited by emailing SWS providers to see if they could share their clients’ contact information.

All other organizations except for one were large companies with over 500 employees in one location. Another remark of the organizations was that many had just begun using the application. Thus, all of them did not have experience before COVID-19. One organization had not launched the application in their offices at the time of the interview, but they already had another SWS before EB.

2.2 Interviews

The interviews were carried out in a semi-structured manner and conducted during the summer and autumn of 2021. Each interview lasted from 20 to 45 min. The interviews took place over Microsoft Teams, and they were recorded. Interview questions were open-ended, and each interviewee was asked the same set of questions:

Q1.

Which company’s service are you using?

Q2.

How long have you been using the service?

Q3.

What is your position in the company?

Q4.

What initiated the need for the application?

Q5.

What do you value most after using it?

Q6.

What works well, and what does not?

Q7.

How much do you use it?

Q8.

What features would you like to see added in the future?

Q9.

Would you like to have any other smart solutions besides the current one?

Q10.

Has this investment been made instead of another smart building solution, such as lighting, EV charging, temperature sensors, smart locks to be opened with phones, etc.?

Q11.

What department initiated the demand for the service in your company?

2.3 Quantitative material

Remes et al.’s (2022) quantitative data set was used to further analyse the interviews. The quantitative data describe what features SWSs have and how common they are. The data were collected in the spring of 2020 by sending binary questions to the 33 studied companies and by examining their web pages. In three cases, this data was confirmed with in-depth interviews. Overall, there were 36 smart features.

2.4 Analysis

The interviews were transcribed word by word and then analysed using the coding method introduced in Creswell (2014). Features obtained by Remes et al. (2022) were used, and categories were created for the codes based on the frequency and thematic relevance of the features. The categories were:

• features that appeared in more than half of the interviews;

• features that appeared in two to four of the interviews; and

• features mentioned in one or none of the interviews.

The grouping does not consider whether the interviewees perceived the feature as well-working, but it indicates that a particular feature was necessary based on their organization’s needs.

Finally, themes were constructed based on the interviews and literature to analyse why the most frequently emerging features were important for FM.

3. Results

The interview data were coded according to the features that emerged in Remes et al. (2022). These codes are presented in Table 3. Some codes have been extended from the original definition to aid clarity. For example, the “free spaces” feature, which describes visualizing available desks and rooms, has been extended to “show free spaces and room information”. This information can be, for example, the type of room or COVID-19 restrictions.

Table 3 shows the feature’s name, how many interviews it occurred in, how often it appears in the applications and if it is available in EB or OW. The table does not consider if the interviewed company has already implemented the feature. If the interviewee said a function is something they do not wish to have, it is not marked in the table. The features shown in this table were limited so that the 15 most occurring features from the material are displayed, and other features are only present if one or more interviewees mention them.

3.1 Category 1

The first category consisted of features considered relevant by at least five organizations. These features were desk booking, showing free spaces and room information, occupancy data, a search box, service tickets and people flow. All interviewees mentioned booking desks and meeting rooms, occupancy data and service tickets. In addition, seven participants discussed the following features: show free spaces, six about search boxes and five about people flow.

The most important feature for almost all interviewees was occupancy and utilization data, and most of their development ideas considered how it was displayed to the FM. Organizations actively used occupancy data to determine which spaces were used and how often. According to interviewees, the occupancy data also provided valuable information about the working culture and impartial information to develop spaces. Another feature mentioned by all interviewees was service tickets, which are a relevant tool for FM to maintain the facilities and get user feedback. All organizations agreed that placing tickets was more accessible for end users than before implementing the application. However, some considered that the feature would need improvements in managing the tickets at FM’s end.

Seven of eight interviewees mentioned that showing free spaces and information to occupants was an important feature. For instance, one stated that their initial reason for getting the application was to show the workers that they had different spaces available. Previously, workers had booked larger meeting rooms because they were unsure if an ad hoc meeting room would be available for their smaller meeting. After implementing the application, booking these larger rooms was no longer necessary. Moreover, visualizing available desks and workspaces was considered an excellent way to relieve employees’ anxiety in a workplace strategy without personal desks. For example, a worker can check in the morning if desks are still available and if their colleagues are present.

Most interviewees mentioned booking spaces and desks as relevant features, even though not all were implementing the feature yet because of COVID-19. Only one organization did not consider booking spaces relevant, because after using the application, they realized meeting rooms and desks were always available. Six interviewees mentioned a search box for finding colleagues, spaces and other information. Five interviewees mentioned people flowing. It is a feature related to which spaces are visited as employees move around the workplace. The feature has many purposes, such as understanding journeys through the office and monitoring social distancing during COVID-19.

3.2 Category 2

The second category consisted of features mentioned in —two to four interviews. These features included wayfinding, calendar sync, IEQ monitoring, hospitality management, room displays, showing free parking spaces, cleaning management and lunch queues.

Half of the participants discussed wayfinding. It was seen as a helpful feature for the end-user because it saves time navigating a large office. However, wayfinding was the only core feature from the Remes et al. (2022) study that over half of the interviewees did not mention. Another feature mentioned by half of the interviewees was IEQ monitoring. There were two purposes for collecting the data. One reason was to adjust the heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems in a new building, and the other was to share information about indoor conditions with the occupant.

Showing free parking spaces was considered a desirable feature by three interviewees. According to them, parking space availability was a parameter that people would check in the morning before deciding whether to come to the office. However, this feature was not widely implemented among organizations. Another feature mentioned by three organizations was cleaning management. The interviewees discussed the benefits of creating a cleaning list based on recent desk usage that the cleaning company could use.

Two interviewees mentioned the benefits of synchronizing the resource management software, such as Microsoft Exchange and Google Calendar, and the end-user application to book spaces. Hospitality management, room displays and queuing time at the canteen were mentioned by two attendees as well.

3.3 Category 3

The last category consisted of features mentioned once or not at all. These features included asset tracking, access control, a lunch menu, financial performance, catering services, personal layout, unattendance, equipment, building performance and space release.

Only the 15 most common SWS features from Remes et al. (2022) are listed in Table 1; thus, some of the features have been left out. These were considered less relevant for FM. For example, work time tracking might not be as attractive to FM as it is to managers. Similarly, unattendance and searching for rooms based on their equipment might be more interesting to the end-users. More surprisingly, none of the interviewees referred to maintenance planning and budgeting, even though it was an available feature in both SWSs. Not mentioned, but common features in SWSs were unattendance, equipment, building performance metrics and space release. Searching for rooms based on their equipment was not mentioned, but it is closely related to sharing information with workers about rooms.

3.4 Themes

From the interview results, themes were created to understand how these features benefit FM. Themes were more abstract than the categories but combined multiple features such as categories (Creswell, 2014). The themes arising from the interviews were space development, enabling new working practices and maintenance. All three themes were constructed based on category one and can be considered relevant for the interviewees. They are also closely related to FM and user-centredness.

The first theme arising from the results was space development. Space development was, for example, a motivation to gather occupancy data. Seven of the eight interviewees mentioned it directly; thus, it could be considered a substantive theme. Moreover, space development in terms of reducing it was predominantly present in the literature (Dooley, 2018; Jayantha and Oladinrin, 2019; Leesman, 2023; Tagliaro et al., 2021).

The second theme was enabling new working practices. This theme comprises features that can help workers adopt new ways of working in an activity-based office and hybrid work. These include features such as booking, searching for colleagues and equipment and wayfinding. In addition, the theme encompasses everything that may be communicated to the workers by visualizing it in the application. It also includes the information workers give through the application, such as their preferred workplace spaces. The importance of implementing ABW or flexible work was also highlighted, for example, in (Chua et al., 2022; Marzban et al., 2022; Shifrin and Michel, 2022). The last theme, closely related to the core of FM, was maintenance. For example, service tickets can be placed through the application to enable fast and efficient care.

4. Analysis

The research shows that facility managers benefit from the deployment in three thematic areas, which are related to space development, enabling new working practices and maintenance. There is also an interdependence between these themes, resulting in an aggregation of benefits. For example, features that help inform space needs can also enable new working practices. One example of this double benefit is related to desk sensors installed on each desk. The sensor shows the employees which desks are available in real-time via a colour code on the interactive floorplan. This helps employees adjust from a dedicated desk-per-person policy to activity-based offices where desks are shared. It does this by helping employees find a free desk easily. The IoT desk sensors also collect historical occupancy data on which desks have been used and when. This helps define the space needs.

4.1 Space development

The investment in SWS is typically made to enable workplaces to be more user-centred and to support new working practices such as ABW. The good and surprising news for FM is that they significantly benefit from the deployment of SWS, even though the deployment is driven by other more people-focused functions in the organization. As mentioned, SWSs generally have occupancy sensors on each desk, in each phone booth and in small ad hoc and large meeting rooms. This helps FM make cost savings related to space by providing data on (a) how much space is needed in total and (b) what combination of desks and rooms is needed in the new layout. The first phase of reducing space can be called Reduce, and the second phase of optimizing the new layout can be called Reconfigure.

The reduction phase uses the data to understand the total amount of space needed, and the peak desk utilization data shows the highest number of desks occupied at any one time. The number of desks could be reduced by 50%, meaning 250 desks would be allocated to a company with 500 employees. This calculation can also be done for all rooms, such as phone booths, ad hoc rooms and meeting rooms. The occupancy sensor data helps the FM to determine how much space is needed based on historical data. One interviewee described how their company justified the investment in the SWS via space reductions:

I would say that the way we sort of got the money for it was by reducing office space. So, we did a business case around that we remove a fifth of the office space in [location], for instance, and from those savings we can invest in Empathic Building and other stuff.

The reconfiguration phase uses the historic occupancy sensor data and the new workplace strategy to design a new activity-based layout where employees choose spaces based on their activity mode, such as meeting, team collaboration or concentration. The data can be used to continually reconfigure the space allocation and to change the number of desks in open office areas, quiet rooms, or team areas. Also, to change the proportion of phone booths, small ad hoc rooms and large meeting rooms. As one of the interviewees described:

The good thing is we can now react to different needs in real-time and based on facts. We can move elements, for example phonebooths, to better serving locations and it is easy to justify since we have the data.

4.2 Enabling new working practices

Another benefit of SWS for FM is that it can enable new working practices by softening the transition from a dedicated desk-per-person policy to ABW. It may be surprising that FM has a role in managing this change. However, FM does need to convince the office stakeholders to adopt ABW to maximize the space reduction, and SWS can help with this transition. SWS can show the desk and room availability in real time. It can explain the new workplace rules, such as which areas are for quiet work or which areas are for collaboration. It also helps employees find their colleagues. “We had a large change from personal desks to hot-desking. We must have a tool that tells people where their colleagues are and how to find them”.

Features such as desk booking can also give employees an extra level of control and ensure that they will have a desk to sit at when they arrive at the office. As one FM interviewee said, “The best feature for the user might be that they can book the best window seats in advance”. ABW offices remove employees’ dedicated desks, and one benefit is increased collaboration by employees sitting in a diverse range of areas and meeting colleagues from different departments. However, this does create an increased need for wayfinding and maps to find hidden meeting rooms:

We have multiple floors, large building and multiple negotiation rooms with weird names. I like that I can find the meeting room from the application and see where I should be heading to.

4.3 Maintenance

FM also benefits from the fact that SWS makes it easy for employees to make accurate service tickets. There seems to be a double benefit to employees clicking on the interactive floorplan and describing the problem. This means that employees are more likely to make tickets as they use that same tool daily and are familiar with it, and the problem’s location is very clearly communicated as it is accurately placed on the interactive floor plan. For example, FM teams do not have to walk aimlessly looking for a broken light bulb. Another result of employees sitting in a diverse range of areas around the building is a lack of ownership of desks and other spaces. If a desk or chair is broken, employees will just sit elsewhere. Simple and accurate service ticket generation helps to speed up the maintenance process:

Often, we received information in a survey conducted once a year that a chair has been broken for six months and no one has done anything to it. This application helps us to receive the maintenance needs in real-time.

5. Discussion

SWSs differ from traditional smart building technologies by focusing on the building’s end-user. They aim to be easy to use and make life more convenient in office buildings by saving employees’ time, helping them to find their colleagues and avoiding getting lost (Remes et al., 2022). Remes et al. (2022) also described the benefits that SWS bring to “building managers” by saying that they can be used to analyse which spaces and desks are the most popular and that this data can be used to remove unpopular spaces and replace them with ones that are more in demand.

This article analyses the benefits of SWSs from the FM point of view, and the first theme arising from the results was space development. The impetus for change and for deploying an SWS is primarily driven by cost savings related to reductions in office space (Marzban et al., 2022). Using accurate occupancy data to understand the total amount of needed space is even more relevant after the COVID-19 pandemic. Remote working increased during the pandemic when many office buildings were closed, and this working style has become more acceptable in many organizations even though office buildings have reopened (Chua et al., 2022). This increase in remote work means that office buildings are less occupied than before the pandemic. Leesman (2023) has referred to this monumental shift towards remote working, and thus, many companies have the opportunity to reduce the amount of space that they occupy. Reducing occupied space can deliver considerable cost and environmental benefits for an organization (Dooley, 2018). Also, using the same data to continually reconfigure the space allocation, such as the proportion of phone booths and small ad hoc rooms, aligns with that observed in WeWork (Lees, 2018).

The second theme was enabling new working practices and reducing space, which often requires transitioning from a dedicated desk-per-person policy to ABW. Scholars have reported shortcomings of ABW environments related to how they are implemented and how occupants use them (Marzban, et al., 2022). However, SWS can soften this transition and increase well-being and productivity in ABW (Remes et al., 2022). It is important to remember that occupancy sensors have two purposes. They aid the transition to ABW by helping employees easily find a free desk, and they also collect historic occupancy data. Cooper et al. (2017) have even stated that in ABW environments, the benefit of occupancy sensors for helping employees find desks is so high that it justifies the costs of the sensors on their own. However, some risks are associated with occupancy sensors in office environments. Surveillance of the employees, linking the IoT data to individuals and employee refusal of the technology are the main risks (Nappi and de Campos Ribeiro, 2020).

The final theme was maintenance, which is closely related to the core of FM. SWSs also provide employees with continuous feedback and post-occupancy evaluation, which is a key element when assessing the overall FM performance in a building (Abisuga et al., 2020).

6. Conclusions

FM’s relevance in organizing ABW and flexible work cannot be disputed. They are at the core of creating office spaces that support well-being and productivity. Traditionally, creating user-centred offices has focused on comfort, health and well-being. However, according to the SRI definition, buildings should also promote convenience and share information with occupants. To fulfil this new area, SWSs have emerged.

This article aimed to further explore the emerging and rapidly growing area of SWSs from FM’s perspective. The focus on FM in this study sheds light on the buying practices of organizations that deploy SWS. The question was: Which of the SWS features are the most relevant from the FM viewpoint, and why? The hypothesis was that the features associated with space use would be the most useful for FM as space efficiency has decreased because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

From the interviews conducted, it can be seen that benefits from the deployment of SWS in three thematic areas related to space development, enabling new working practices and maintenance are derived by facility managers. An SWS helps the FM by providing data on how much space is needed, data on how to continuously reconfigure the remaining space over time, and by softening the transition from a dedicated desk per person policy to ABW. They also help the employees to create accurate service tickets, which speed up problem-solving related to maintenance tasks. The results indicate that the most important single features connected to these are occupancy data, service tickets and showing available spaces and room information to the occupants.

A relatively small sample limited this study. However, SWSs are an emerging field of technology, and therefore, the pool of people to interview was initially small. Another limitation was that this study focused on office buildings only, but SWSs could be helpful in other building types, such as hospitals. Nonetheless, different building types can learn from the benefits FM receives in the area of user-centred offices.

The evolution of office buildings after COVID-19 will continue, and SWS can play an important role in optimizing the amount of space each company occupies. This, in turn, can reduce operating costs for companies related to rent, energy and other facility costs such as maintenance and cleaning. Optimizing the amount of space each company occupies also reduces the environmental impact of energy consumption and the embodied emissions of building materials.

Designing post-pandemic offices or new normal offices is a dynamic research area at the moment, and further research is needed to understand how to optimize space reductions while supporting collaboration, innovation and organizational learning.

Table 1.

Feature categories in SWSs based on their occurrence in the applications (Remes et al., 2022)

The core (in at least 75% of SWSs)	Layer 1 (in at least 45% of SWSs)	Layer 2 (in at least 35% of SWSs)	Layer 3 (in less than 35% of SWSs)
• Booking • Show free spaces • Occupancy data • Wayfinding • Search box	• Unattendance • Service tickets • People flow • Calendar sync • Indoor environment quality (IEQ)	• Equipment • Hospitality • Building performance • Room displays • Asset tracking • Space releasing	• Access control • Lunch menu • Financial performance • Catering services • Show free parking • Personal layout • Cleaning management

Source: Table courtesy of Remes et al. (2022)

Table 2.

Information of the interviewees

Company	Interviewee title	Employees (in one location)	Location (interviewee)	SWS
A	Work environment expert and product owner	5,000	Finland	OW
A	Product owner: facilities and acquisition	5,000	Finland	OW
B	Facility manager	1,000	Finland	OW
C	Facility manager	<500	Norway	EB
D	Facility manager	4,000	Sweden	EB
E	Head of workplace innovation and management	2,000	Finland	EB
F	General manager real estate	500	Finland	EB
G	Facilities and Nordic technological development portfolio manager	700	Finland	EB

Source: Created by the authors

Table 3.

SWS features, their prevalence in SWSs (Remes et al., 2022) and their prevalence in the interviews

Feature/code	Prevalence in interviews	Prevalence in SWSs (%)	Prevalence in OW/EB
Category 1
Occupancy data	8/8	92	OW/EB
Service tickets	8/8	58	OW/EB
Show free spaces and room information	7/8	94	OW/EB
Booking	6/8	94	OW/EB
Search box	6/8	78	OW/EB
People flow	5/8	56	OW/EB
Category 2
Wayfinding	4/8	81	EB
IEQ	4/8	47	OW/EB
Calendar sync	3/8	47	EB
Show free parking	3/8	28	OW/EB
Cleaning management	3/8	19	OW/EB
Hospitality	2/8	44	EB
Room displays	2/8	42	EB
Lunch queue	2/8	6	–
Category 3
Asset tracking	1/8	39	EB
Access control	1/8	33	EB
Lunch menu	1/8	31	EB
Financial performance	1/8	31	OW
Catering services	1/8	28	EB
Personal layout	1/8	22	OW/EB
Unattendance	0/8	67	EB
Equipment	0/8	44	EB
Building performance	0/8	44	OW/EB
Space releasing	0/8	39	EB

Source: Table courtesy of Remes et al. (2022)