Now that the economy is going well, the demand for better and more office space rises fast. In the city of Amsterdam, 500.000m2 is being build in the next 4 years, just to give an example. To avoid high office vacancies caused by to generic design, the city council has decided to create more designated buildings. Spaces that are allocated to a specific company before they are actually build. This would mean that new workplaces can be created from scratch and that in theory, hospitality services could be included in the design. Something that seems logical but we still see too little of in many projects. The risk of not including the hospitality design in offices, is that a company becomes anonymous and delivers a generic workplace experience. Obviously failing to strengthen the company brand or the employee well-being. We feel strongly about creating a hospitality experience that is in harmony with the companies values. However from our experience we can say that this is certainly an area to work on.....   

 

Walking into an office building these days can create a schizophrenic event, a front desk occupied by visibly externally sourced security, a company logo furnished with a general waiting area and to top it off, an unrelated branded coffee cup. This unharmonious condition is damaging to the overall customer journey, especially when if the first face your visitor greets is not your own staff.

 

From Mish-Mash to Harmony 

The contemporary mish-mash of brands, service solutions and visuals that dominate buildings is the result of service providers pushing their agenda. Usually, their solutions have many efficiency and economic benefits. However, due to services that are streamlined into concepts, providers often roll out these concepts without adjusting them to their new clients. Who really benefits from seeing a caterers logo in the restaurant? We believe this can be done more elegantly and true to your company values so that services may help the company in more than just efficiency and economics. Integrating hospitality in your overall company culture and values creates cohesion and energy.

 

What does google say

Introducing your values into hospitality means that the first face your client meets, breathes and speaks your language and that the catering staff exactly knows how your company eats. Dare to take control and responsibility for your hospitality and services by becoming involved in them. While hospitality may not be your core business or primary process, it can still contribute in essential ways. Take hospitality seriously, because your future employees look at it closely. Having a sensitive and a serious approach to hospitality is attractive to employees and future employees. “Companies like Alphabet have invested more in employee support and employee satisfaction has risen as a result. For Google, it rose by 37%; they know what they are talking about. Under scientifically controlled conditions, making workers happier really pays off,” they explain. 

 

Take it further

We believe that hospitality can go much further. Currently, hospitality services are aimed towards helping physical processes that help run your company, like the reception or restaurant. But new ways of working and increasing collaborative work creates a need for a whole new set of services, thoughtful services. Think of things that add intelligent value to your primary process, like workshop leaders, brainstorm hosts, inspirators, and trend forecasters.

 

In the future services are there to capture your company culture and transfer them into concepts and energetic services. The future is something that occupies us when we work on hospitality projects for our clients. We think beyond the problem and try to see how we can create something that is thoughtful and smart, which is unique in each case. We do this by really submerging ourselves into the culture and its issues, where it needs help, where it is annoyed and where it enjoys itself. Culture is a living thing, that needs to be respected and developed. So that's the reason we advocate to create thoughtful hospitality concepts that improve during time and are being incorporated from day 1 in the design proces of a new office building. Lucky enough we can see that our clients Booking.com and CBRE believe in the same strength of hospitality. Together we are making sure that their new office will be completely designed accordingly.