Unleashing the Power of Workplace Design: Enhance Employee Retention & Reignite Office Productivity

[Music] hello and welcome to Red's Business and Technology podcast I'm your host Jackson Barnes I'm co-host Brad Ferris today we're sitting down with Dan Boyce who's the chief growth officer from growth Australia we've been talking everything future fit outs and office fit outs and what the industry has done over the past few years and what's happening in the future Dan thanks for coming in really appreciate your time thank you both for having me I'm uh thrilled to be here I appreciate it no problems man let's start with your background so what'd you do in your professional career before growth Australia yeah thank you so prior to growth I was a commercial leasing agent at Savills here in Brisbane focusing on office leasing in the CBD so I think that's really where my passion for space commercial property started and some good friends of mine started the gross Australia business a bit of banter between friends you know you can sell commercial property you should sell fit out all of that sort of stuff and that's sort of where the uh the marriage and my romantic Journey with growth Australia began cool and um you just want to give an overview of growth Australia what you do um and also why you chosen the name growth Australia yeah fantastic the growth Australia name is a the word growth was an acronym of the founders surnames so Gilmore Russell and Williams and they sort of put those letters up on the board and they had Taylor at that time as well sort of muddled them around and came up with the word growth quite a strong positive word uh three Englishmen it's part of the recruitment policy at growth Australia to be English so right three Englishmen started it and they tried to um get the domain name growth wasn't available and they thought it'd be pretty cool to have the word Australia since we've all moved here in the name um but I've got a bit of news at the end of the podcast of the what's next for growth Australia yeah stay tuned for that kind of thing all right yeah exactly exactly yeah sign a waiver before you release that podcast please and so what does growth Australia do so we design and deliver office workplaces for our clients anything from commercial office Interiors all the way through to to Medical Suites Laboratories daycare facilities all those types of things we had a pretty pivotal shift in what we did about three years ago and Brad and I were just having a bit of a chat off there oh sounds cool to say that doesn't it and uh talking how we pivoted we were probably a more traditional Builder three years ago where we would partner with external Architects which was great got to work with some brilliant firms and saw some really inspirational designs and we would do the costing and the delivery element of that process since then through covid we saw an opportunity to Pivot and bring design in-house so now we cover everything from the first brush stroke down on the piece of paper all the way through to handing the keys over to our clients upon completion okay so what does that look like um practically so you've got um fit out so you do the organized construction also interior designers and that's uh is that what the difference is between a traditional kind of fit out company yeah absolutely so there's there's sort of a design and construct model which is quite common what we've done with it is we really try and focus in on solving an issue or working with our clients to really get to the bottom of what's the need what's driving this office relocation or this office refurbishment and then we're using our interior design and workplace strategy expertise to offer them a solution of how the physical space can solve that issue and then what's been really interesting is working with companies like yourselves is then that technologically overlay to see the physical space and the footprint marry up with the tech to really bring those spaces to life so we're more Consultants on workspace and then we carry it all the way through to the delivery as well but a lot of our value is now front-ended in that workplace consultancy piece okay awesome we'll unpack that a little bit later in terms of what's involved there in the consultancy approach so I appreciate that's probably similar to what we do here to be honest with you with technology so um that's good um also you host a podcast as well let's talk about that really quick before before we jump into them in bones of the fit out Corner space I yeah what's that that about so it's called let's talk growth and I think it was probably born from a similar place as yourselves with your podcast where we wanted to offer content and ideas and provoke thinking with our clients and really be seen as people that are bringing people together sharing ideas and sort of trying to stimulate that conversation so we cover a wide range of topics but the keys really are things that are going to drive business things that business owners or key decision makers senior leaders in businesses would like to know about and can discuss so everything from the war on Talent through to Wellness mental health and all of those things in the workplace as well cool how many episodes out views that kind of stuff I've done eight so I'm not quite as experienced as you two gentlemen veterans Brad just just gotta start and it keeps going yeah it shows as well very very relaxed I feel very relaxed as I guess so that's good that's good all right let's get into them in bones in terms of the fit out industry so we can spend size for listeners who might be business owners or in charge of kind of fitting out the new office or might have an office move plan in the next you know 12 months three years five years that kind of thing but let's roll it back to office fit outs 10 years ago what it looked like traditionally before you started I think traditionally office fits out 10 years ago were really driven by people as a number of people and it was kind of cookie cutter and it was very segmented for the industry as well so for example I'm a legal business owner I need offices I'm an engineer I need big workstations because that's the work we do whereas now we've really seen it morph a little bit more and it's small around giving people purpose and that's one of the big attractions of them coming back into the workplace flexibility future proofing the office space as well so that look what it looks like today it might not be in two or three years time and that's okay again technology paying a really big part in that so the biggest change has been I think the definition of what the office space is and how people engage with it and that's been a really interesting landscape for us to navigate even over the last two or three years let alone the last 10. we definitely see that from a technology perspective you know it was um I think five to ten years ago everyone was like going to those like knock little tiny PC things yeah and behind every screen and almost like the future of technology but then you know change rapidly when um when Kobe hit actually it was like no what are we doing with these boxes and the offers people need to work from home and remote and so on when covert happened in 2020 I imagine they would have shaken up your industry a fair amount do you want to take the us through that process what happened when covert hit and everyone was like winning officers anymore let's go work from home completely or half on hot desk and that kind of thing where uh what happened in your space yeah so the biggest thing was uncertainty which I think is the same for everyone whether it was your family life your personal life your work life there was just that air of uncertainty and everything we did I think in many ways the office space almost became the beacon of light and the one thing the one commonality that everyone every colleague had was the the office space we saw a lot of leaders go to weekly teams uh sorry daily teams meetings where they were talking about updates with the company whether it was you know touch wood furloughed staff or government incentives the communication almost doubled in a lot of these businesses so what we actually saw play out was a little bit of uncertainty where people think that we might retract our footprint we were quite lucky in Brisbane particularly Queensland as opposed to our Southern friends down south where relative to them our lockdowns weren't as sort of stringent and as elongated so I think we were business confidence remained a lot higher in Brisbane than it would have done in Sydney and Melbourne I don't know if you guys saw the same but we certainly noticed that so when those lockdowns did sort of um dilute a little bit there was almost a a pent-up demand to connect people and that's where we we actually saw the opposite where people were thinking that we're going to reduce our Footprints to well look maybe we could take less space but why don't we just keep the same footprint work differently try and keep even more connected than we were and let's pivot let's be nimble so it was actually a great opportunity for us in that construction design and construction industry to help these businesses navigate how they might come back to the office and I remember you guys might have been the same we thought office space would change forever where it'd be screens everywhere and social distancing and it that kind of has eroded slightly yeah so did the design line style change pre and post covered you know you mentioned at the start of the show um people come to you with the problem that they're trying to solve did those problems shift and did the design language design style change were you seeing different requests come through from companies yeah definitely absolutely I think the key Drive is now more than ever are attracting and retaining Talent is a big one um but and that really drives a lot of decisions around the office space because a lot of leaders are looking to their physical footprint as almost a sales tool and a representation of culture like I've walked in your office today and immediately I got a fantastic sense of what type of company you were as transparent there was energy I met the happiness Champion Emma I think it's her birthday yeah sorry sorry Emma apologies um and you know there's music it's visual it's audio visual so I I get a sense as soon as I walk into your space what type of business you are that builds transparency and Trust so for you to bring clients into your space I imagine you're very proud of your space here yeah we are and it's um it really becomes a almost like a sales tool for one of a better word but what it also does is it connects your team so everyone that comes into your workplace feels like they're connected and moving in the right direction because the physical space aligns with what everyone's trying to achieve day to day so that was one of the most powerful things so when how does that play out in the physical layout what we saw was leaders coming to us with you know how can we keep our teams engaged we're not mandating that they come back to the office but we would like them we'd like to encourage them to you know see the office as a magnet not a mandate and one of the biggest things we saw was the definition of a workstation completely changed so before covid most workers in the CBD would spend their days they'd commute in you know 30 40 minutes 20 minutes whatever it was you'd pop your laptop into your workstation and you could be there for three hours at a time have a lunch break back to your workstation emails do we need to do a few phone calls either side of that that's kind of your work day I think the work from home completely flipped that because if people just want to work like that now they're better off doing that from home whereas what we're seeing is you might plug into your workstation for half an hour to scan through your emails put out any fires what meetings have I got today you know then you're off Jackson and I are collaborating at the high table or Brad and I are doing a podcast then we're having a coffee downstairs with a prospective client then I'm going to come back to the beanbag area and have a chat with Emma and we're going to talk about what we've got on the agenda for tomorrow you're only then getting back to your workstation in the afternoon to just follow up on all the meetings you've had so the biggest key is to make sure that we are building those areas for people to succeed and to work all the different ways that they need to around the open plan workstation area so more collaboration areas more quiet rooms all of those types of things what that then does is remove any friction points that people might have of should I come in shouldn't I come in well actually if I do come into the office I'm gonna have all these people I can engage with the vibe and the atmosphere is fantastic I'm aligned with my team and I'm going to be able to get everything I need to do done in the day I'll put you on the spot here a little bit then name three things that actually work to get employees back into the office pinball machines is it you know events on a Friday afternoon like what are the top three things you see because you're probably a really good spot you speak a lot of people yeah that say we want these things and you know you probably see what actually works I don't know if any stats on that but name three things that actually work to get people back in the office mate I'm gonna flip it none of them right honestly okay so if we look at what culture is the the pinball machines the table tennis tables it's it's all superficial the the real key to it is Brad and Nigel As Leaders filtering down that transparency of communication and showing people how to engage with the space showing people how to engage with clients how we want to work as a team that is the only thing that creates real change the the pool table the table tennis table it's a fad it can be a fad if it's not paired with substance so the fact that you guys have married the two up it accentuates how fun those activities are but if you put those in there and they would just a Band-Aid solution then it's insincere so it loses its sincerity and it doesn't it doesn't play out how you want so basically you know when I get on the decks you and I make that remix song about you when I sample you I've sampled his uh voice and I've redid that that Barbra Streisand Duck Sauce instead of Barbra Streisand so that's what the team engages with nice it's not the decks it's a song exactly it's the leadership and the meaning behind the song it's the lyrics I don't want to go there hey so Dan I challenge you went then why should a business spend 100 Grand on a fit out when they could spend 50 if it's all about down from leadership and deploying that kind of culture yeah absolutely I think going back to the first point there's a certain level that businesses should Aspire for their office spaces to get to and one of the key drivers that we we do a a mid project survey and then we go in after we've built our client spaces three months after they've moved in and we say hey look what would you have changed what has this fit out tangibly done for your business so not just you know anecdotally like everyone feels great what are the tangible benefits you've seen from having a new office space one of the biggest ones is that pride of bringing people into your space and that has unlocked new levers of clients it's binded people together a little bit more so there are some tangible benefits to building the office space but just going to open plan just going to hotdesking and agile based working doesn't mean that your culture is going to boost so it's all of those things combined but one of the biggest things we find as I said is that people move spaces when they feel like they no longer represent their brand or the way that they want to work or how their clients work as well so if there's a misalignment in your branding image image or image of yourselves as a business and your physical space that misalignment you need to close that Gap to make sure that it's working for you not against you that's good insights probably why grow so successful in that space you know you have a consultation to learn about their business and their culture and then you design an office around it more so than just the oh this is yeah we do hotdest and this is your breakout rooms depends on the kind of business they are and the kind of culture they're trying to put down on everyone else what is trending down in the office fit out space recently um is there anything new coming out in that space that's interesting to you that you're getting a lot of demand for recently yeah the biggest thing so 78 of our clients are now their breakout spaces are being designed and built in conjunction with their reception spaces which is really interesting so if you think back even five ten years ago your kitchen breakout was sort of at the back of the floor hidden away you didn't want those smells and those sights to be seen but I think it goes back to that point we made earlier where you're really inviting people into your culture the other thing it does is the traditional boardroom is gone where you've got four walls this is only a boardroom and that's the only thing it's used for with the advancements in workplace technology and you guys will be better placed to talk about this we want to have we want to be able to use that boardroom in a multitude of ways so we want it to have an operable wall so we can also open it up and offer training and we want it to spill out into the breakout so when we're hosting events with clients we can start and do a presentation and then we can use it as a golf simulator we've got a golf simulator I've seen your golf simulator I know I know I'm going back on what I said there about lead but we've got good leadership as well um so I'm using the boardroom in a multitude of ways future proofing those the purposes of those spaces is really key but again one of the biggest things people happy to have their kitchen break out visible to clients when they come in almost like a cafe style welcome experience so yeah I'm curious actually um there was these things I think when covered hit um certain vendors are trying to push you down the obviously without space they were like like a box like for people gonna make a phone call personally did that actually take off is that a thing people buy those people did and I think it's again it it they're claustrophobic they're that they are a bit gimmicky yeah um there's there's other ways that you can you can sort of create good Acoustics in the office space without enclosing people into little small boxes yeah I couldn't believe it when I saw those things and I saw it in my office I was like wow the people actually buy and they're expensive too they are yeah very expensive quite quite rooms have gone so um offices have reduced by about 80 so um I can't speak for Brad Brad's probably got a big big shiny office in the corner but it's um the yeah he's nodding yeah this is awkward the um I've also got to do this yeah we are seeing a lot of leaders move out of offices and go into the open plan and those office offices are becoming quiet rooms teams enabled rooms Focus areas those types of things as well okay cool what's the future of the federal industry gonna look like say roll forward five ten years what's going to change I think artificial intelligence is a really interesting one and I'm yet to see how that plays out but it's when we talk about automation technology and where that can go how that changes your physical footprint you know can that AI replace mundane tasks that the team do year in year out day in day out and how's that going to play out in the physical space I don't have an opinion on that yet but that's something I'm excited to see and that's on our radar we want to be early adopters of that so we can advise our clients on look hey this is how you could potentially Embrace this technology you know you're telling us you need 5 000 square meters you've got 400 staff if you were to embrace this sort of way of working this way of Technology could that be 3 000 square meters what would that look like and how would you change the physical space to align with that so are you envisioning like so we didn't have a receptionist at the front right we've just got to eventually a phone with a screen there and you dial through the person you want they come grab you are you envisioning there's going to be like a a big screen there with an AI when you walk in welcoming you saying the Hologram hologram at the front yeah that's good yeah if you're singing the song yes maybe Emma will scare people away if it's me out there but if you were if you look at like that's not a waste of space but you're that's a chunk of space out there that you're paying rent on that you're probably not utilizing you've got the big reception desk the the hero welcome and then there's there's no one there to greet you yeah so it's not a poor entry experience but it's um you know I think things like that will evolve as well we were thinking of this other club Red Zone we were thinking of Red lounge oh nice I like that yeah up the top there and there you go having like a repurpose the space there used to be a turntable out there with records so people could could put on a record and play but the guys stole it that's out the back now yeah oh there you go so Dan um I'll explain you any other questions I don't know I'm just having a free flow freestyle here critique our office man you've done the tour what what are we doing wrong what are we doing right he's put me on the spot again isn't he yeah you thought I kind of music I can't use transparency and Leadership on this one um that is it's brilliant I mean you're the I can already tell that the our businesses are quite aligned I mean we've got a golf simulator um that doubles up we'll get one stream yeah just Lucas you didn't hear that definitely it's got a bit of a slice on it though unfortunately yeah it doesn't no it must be broken um but uh yeah no it's fantastic so there's nothing I would change per se because the how we look at office spaces and the design team are different they come through with a different lens where they're looking at you know how people feel in the space and the color palette so if you're walking into a light space one thing I would say is there's quite some quite dark finishes throughout so maybe some more lighter areas on the floor because we really want to tap into as well make it tangible but understand when people are working in different environments acoustically visually um the light you know arcadic Rhythm all of that stuff how that affects their mood their productivity and all of those types of types of things so that's one lens that we look at it but as far as the elements that you've got how I felt through the space people are engaged everyone looked friendly um and you've got a good multitude of a good mixture of work points as well where it doesn't feel like a call center there's different heights you've got the sit to stand workstation so that's always important as well yep I think the meeting rooms make sense they're on the perimeter so a lot of people are now bringing in sort of offices and that into the center of the core so yeah again that Natural Light Element probably comes through to the tech guys but it's you know it's it's not one fit for all there's there's not the perfect office space there's so many elements to consider and I I suppose that's where that consultancy and that upfront stage one work we do with clients is so important to understand what do we what is what is essential to Red to achieve with this office space and what are you going through as a business and how can we marry the two but people come to you prior to finding a space you know so so with this I'll just use current examples have we kind of inherited the layout here and we had what we had to work with um physically if you like we'd knock down a few walls um those officers continued down where the pool table in the video game so we knocked down some walls and we could do a bit but obviously you know we had to kind of work with with what we had um but obviously if you were if you if you really had a vision and you wanted to execute that Vision you'd probably want and you were going to work with a consultant you know all the way I would imagine wrong potentially from selecting the right location the right building the right space like if you really want to get that execute on that vision would you guys be engaged pre-lease if you like or pre-building selection yeah absolutely so that definitely it's a great Point what are consultancy focuses on is getting you the right solution and safeguarding you throughout that process as well so there's a couple of things we need to consider and we don't want to be hemmed in we don't want the property to lead the decision we want the need the needs analysis and the need of the business to drive the process not the other way around I.E we like this building make us fit into this building right we can absolutely do that but ideally what we would do is sit down and do an hour's design workshop and again we make it tangible so it's not um sort of it's not hypothetical thinking it's getting to the core of how are you currently using your space now what's working what's not challenge your thinking around how much space you need and how your teams are going to engage with that space we then build out what we call a ghost test fit so that's an idyllic floor plate can be on a rectangle or a hexagon or core can do a Central Central core where central core essentially is if you can walk all around like a physical model no it we do we do it in three we can do it in 3D but we typically just do it on 2D to start with and what we're trying to demonstrate there is in a utopian environment how would the sales team engage with the IT Tech Team how would HR and accounts work together what proximity would everyone have to share services so once you've got that utopian floor plate then when we go in short list properties we can advise you and say guys we think you need to go to market for five to six hundred square meters based on that you know natural light Central core um five-star neighbors rating because that ties in with you know your ESG whatever you're doing we would recommend this we then can either put you in touch with a property professional or support you as you go on those inspections if you're going direct with agents in the landlord and then we overlay that lens that we've all agreed on is success and what winning looks like so then when you're looking at the different floor plates the different agendas the different terms you've got that true north to refer back to and we can show you the Gap analysis on each floor plate so how often do you get that kind of Greenfield situation or like would more of your clients come I mean obviously that's a preferred way to do it that's probably the the recommended way to do it yeah definitely if you find people do it are you more having to fit people into what they've already got or do people do you get people coming to you right from the start we do and it it's it's often we're going to them you know what it's like it's it's it it and I suppose because that's what we're searching for and what we're trying to represent and the language we're using when we're talking to people we're naturally gravitating towards those opportunities if we come in too late in the piece I.E hey we've got these buildings we're going out to three can you put your cheapest price in and cost this plan that's just not the way we add value and we just don't want to play in that space if we if we don't we're as I said we're we're skilled across all the disciplines but the passion of the team and with our skill set and and where we're geared is to really Safeguard our clients at the front end because then what we do once we've got that utopian environment we're also looking at Building Services air conditioning requirements loading all those things and Advising our clients before they sign their heads of agreement on any hairs that could potentially be with this asset that they should negotiate with the landlord or that they should consider that might cost them more in fitting out this floor as opposed to the other one because of item a b and c so really before they sign their agreement what they get from us is full transparency on what their space what their fit out could cost so how they can then apportion their incentive to work out what rent they're going to be paying in year one two three Etc what the fill out costs are going to be what the fill out timeline is going to be and anything that we see as potential hurdles that could cost them money down the track package that up before they make their financial decision and then um and Safeguard them and then stage two for us is carrying through to the build which believe it or not is the easy part it's the a lot of the work's done in that procurement and and the front end imagine it would be to be honest um what are some fails you've seen from people that go and do a fit out and maybe William and after and say hmm probably should have consulted you first but we've gone and done this what are some files you've seen yeah so it's brilliant like it's like the bad tattoos isn't it similar sort of thing you should do it for office spaces now look it's and again it it's soundproofing and Acoustics is a massive one okay so that's one of the things in cost plans that people take out the most is um it gets optioned out all the time because it is essentially battle that you don't see um sometimes it can sit on the wall like you've got here that acoustic treatment it's not cheap to install and it's baffle that goes above the ceiling and and sort of in in between the petitions as well that really improves the acoustic properties of meeting rooms but people don't tangibly put a value to it because they just assume if it's an enclosed room it should have us it should be fully soundproof and it's not the case so when we do that post to survey with our clients one of the biggest things that they wish they'd done was create more collaboration space and also um really take the acoustic properties and the battle a little bit more seriously so we're going in and retrofitting those areas after the fact there's no no major Horrors um people sort of have lended too much room to reception spaces but that's starting to change okay um size of breakout space is being too small that type of thing but you know I certainly haven't seen meeting rooms coming out of ceilings and and that sort of stuff so yeah no real no real horror shows didn't expect that but that's a good some good Insight people listening around the sound and Acoustics and meeting rooms that kind of stuff and I Envision what you touched on there around the breakout rooms being too small is that because they try and gets less square meter Edge and try and fit all the people in they're not and not focus so much on the breakout spaces I think it's just a little bit of a a change of thinking as well for a lot of business owners you know typically particularly in the legal fraternity it's they don't want if you're not at your desk billing you're kind of you're what you you're not being productive so lunch rooms were kept quite small and weren't seen as as third spaces where people could collaborate or have a casual meeting or do a presentation or do a town hall that's completely changed the breakout now is being seen as a foundation to bring different teams together for a bump meeting or try and encourage that collaboration which Fosters the culture so it's it's a shift in mindset but one of the good ways to do that is to Tech enable the breakouts as well so they are multi-purpose you do have AV that you can present on you can plug your laptop in and do some work there if you need to or have a casual Meeting those types of things good insights what's next for both Australia well this is this the uh the the mic drop moment I won't drop the markets yes but it's stationed it is it is if it wasn't I would have dropped it so we are rebranding cool and I think it's uh it I won't I won't say the name oh we're going from growth Australia Australia's gone okay when our growth workplace design cool so and I think it again ties to what we've spoken about today that when we were thinking about the Rebrand and investing the money and having a new logo new colors and having our brand guidelines we thought are we just trying to make ourselves feel good you know that the business is going well surely we just keep trying to repeat what we're doing and then we thought well no we feel misaligned to our clients and the work we do and we feel that the brand we've got at the moment I mean this was a seven dollar logo that the guys wow and it's been great and you know it's been it's been going for five years and I don't think we've ever lost anything from our brand but we really wanted to create that sense of camaraderie and that there was something exciting that were all moving towards and that you know previously I don't think if you'd asked um and we did we asked the growth Heights and 30 of them what do growth do and you know you there's 25 different answers yeah none of them wrong but we wanted a succinct message because I think if you create that Unity that comes across in everything you do and you're holding yourselves the same way um you know you're dealing with clients the same way we want that consistency of customer service we're we're a customer service business so that was important to us to align that with with what our clientele were doing yeah that's too much probably a good move like I um when I first had to go to Australia I thought it was a marketing company I was kind of like oh growth Australia then I realized it was fit outs and I was like oh cool okay interesting um so they make complete sense it's been validated good I didn't know it was acronyms for the owners of the business actually yeah yeah great story I guess from the outside before you know that um I was like our growth is like a you know marketing kind of company so that makes perfect sense um rebranding and that's exciting news so and what's the what's the red where was that so it's uh reimagine everything done what did you think we did before you walked in I thought it was a DJ you know it was like an indoor Club an indoor an indoor Ibiza sort of guy I was expecting the uh the VR goggles to come out and oh we do have I'm not surprised no I I knew it was yeah it was digital and that but I think um the way you guys engage with your clients and the amount of services you offer is that similar is there some synergies there do you find that you're more Consultants than just hey we need I'm definitely right so all we are is really like the Consulting piece um and support around technology it's all right really is right um and started as that pure digital advisory business before we went on to the support side yeah um so advice is um yeah basically a large large portion of what we do around technology as you probably know within technology being so broad there's a lot of um gaps in knowledge for business owners and CFOs and so on so that's kind of where we have we have the same problem though right like quite often uh people will will come and they have a tech stack and they'll say make that work yeah whereas my preferences will actually this is the better solution but you know it's always give and take and costs involved and moving and changing and so and do people often underestimate or overestimate what changing that stack or getting a better solution I definitely it's uh choose my words here it can be quite thankless at times in in the sense that I don't think the average customer has any idea how much that goes on behind the scenes to deliver the outcome that they ultimately are looking to achieve look the hard part for us is um we've got often a tangent here but you walk around office and if you've got broken desks and you've got nowhere to have meetings you know you're in a bad state with technology it's kind of hidden you don't unless you there's a hit with obviously something cyber threat wise or a breach you're not a problem but before then just little niggly things um the underlying is there's a problem so people don't therefore see a lot of value in it um or no otherwise because I've had that kind of same kind of I.T environment for quite some times that I know there's a problem and Technology changes so much you feel what is awesome five years ago is very bad right now yes absolutely it's quite a different in our space and I'm interested to get you a guy Source because when we think about technology we we really overlay as early as we can in the piece because we understand that as again the physical and that they have to marry up and if we want that boardroom to have a multitude purposes we need to understand what needs to be done do you guys ever walk through layouts or your clients office spaces and think look this is just not if this was designed differently it would you know similar it looks like connectivity is probably well connectivity and things like um you know meeting room systems Etc are really important so again it would be nice to be brought in probably when you're doing your sure uh assessment because um you know can't connect to the Wi-Fi or Wi-Fi's not working is like one of the biggest issues that we get but you're sometimes constrained by you either have to run cables through brick walls or places where cables really can't be run retrospectively or you have to put in more devices like this you know it it would be ideal if yes you're involved at the design stage yeah sure especially around connectivity which we do sometimes for like kind of your current businesses or clients um they'll send us a floor plan and say like where are we putting the rack for example the way we're putting firewalls and access points and that kind of stuff so we do kind of get involved a little bit in that and obviously in the meeting Tech space which kind of gets bolt on later most of the time to be honest with you not from the outset um it would be probably ideal if you weren't engaged earlier on the meeting room side yeah there's more about the cork on it Services I'd say uh people need it like more like to provide Wi-Fi and a network secure network that kind of stuff is where we kind of usually get involved yeah fantastic and I like the the support element that you guys provide as well we're very similar in a sense that that consultancy is is important like think post covid with all the uncertainty it goes back to you're so right it's that clear advice from a trusted provider that people rely on but then they also rely on the support everyone's so busy now doing their day-to-day and I feel like everyone you speak to is at 120 to 140 capacity I never remember people being like that before covid so I don't know if what what kind of the psychology is before that but when was the last time you spoke to someone and said yeah no look we're doing okay it's all going well everyone you speak to is absolutely hammering so I think then service providers that can really offer that level of service and that you know we're a safe Pair of Hands mentality are really um cutting a having great success and Longevity so and definitely what we do is obviously uh more on going on the small piece but also in terms of if you set up a network or a 365 environment someone you know you have to be continuously improving that um if you turn it on and leave it there like I said before like a year two years later you're behind yeah sure things to do there might be might have to come on your show to explain more no well we'll have to uh to do a return match and uh we can Spotlight Yeah in our studio maybe we'll see yeah all right damn man thanks again really appreciate your time you just hear some good insights around future fit out space and what's happening and that kind of how it helps culture and get people back in the office so I do appreciate what you've shared today um if someone wants to get in touch with you if we'll find out more how can they reach you yeah just send a um comms growth australia.com.edu um

find us on the website well there's a new website coming so I might uh I might share the link to that when it launches first of July will be the launch that'll be cool workplace designs so yeah awesome yeah find me on LinkedIn um and uh yeah we'd love to chat thanks for coming in [Music]

2023-06-20 04:30

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