How to measure, manage, and maximize office space utilization

If your commute has felt a little more crowded lately, it might be the result of 96% of companies mandating onsite attendance. To prepare for the increase in folks in the workplace, you need to understand how they’re using your space. Then, you can make changes based on these learnings to boost utilization, maximize efficiency, and reduce operational costs. 

But improved efficiency and cost savings aren’t the only benefits of better space utilization. It also creates a more comfortable, productive environment for everyone onsite. That means fewer employees coming onsite briefly just to meet your attendance mandate—yes, we’re talking about the dreaded “coffee badging”—and more folks fully engaging with their workspace.

In this post, we’ll explore all angles of office space utilization, from what it is and why it matters to the important metrics and solutions you need to improve your workplace. We’ll cover:

• What is office utilization?
• What are the benefits of measuring office utilization? 
• What metrics can you use to measure office utilization?
• 3 tips for improving your workplace utilization
• How Envoy can help improve your office utilization

What is office utilization?

Office utilization refers to how effectively companies use their space to meet employee and organizational needs. To understand how effectively you’re utilizing your office, you should track key workplace data points, including employee attendance rates, visitor foot traffic, and space usage.

What are the benefits of measuring office utilization? 

Measuring office utilization is the first step to improving your workplace. To be successful, you need data. Without it, you’re operating blindly. With it, you can spot inefficiencies, make informed decisions, and ensure your space better aligns with your employee and organizational needs. All of this is crucial to improving your office utilization and maximizing your real estate investments. Here are a few benefits of measuring office utilization using workplace data. 

• Better space planning. Nearly a third of workplace leaders aim to repurpose unused space. Data empowers you to do this by helping you spot opportunities to reduce inefficient and underutilized spaces. You can also use data to identify the types of spaces employees value most and create more of them, lowering your vacancy levels.
• Cost savings and efficient resource use. Space utilization data helps you make informed, cost-saving decisions, such as repurposing space to increase its use. Efficient use of space reduces unnecessary overhead and ensures resources are allocated where they’re needed most. 
• Improved workplace experience. With the right data in hand, you can design spaces that provide employees more comfort, boost collaboration and productivity, and support a better workplace experience.
• Informed decision-making for future space needs. Considering a move? Rationalize future space investments by providing executives valuable insight into your occupancy rate and space utilization trends. With this data, they can make measured decisions about whether or not to downsize or expand their real estate portfolio. 
• Increased agility and adaptability. Quickly adjust office layouts to accommodate changing requirements. This flexibility helps maintain operational efficiency and ensures your workspace can adapt to your company’s evolving needs. For example, if you notice that phone booths are being used more frequently than larger meeting rooms, you might check employee attendance data to determine whether this is a one-off instance—such as end-of-month sales calls—or a recurring pattern. If it’s recurring, it could be smart to invest in more phone booths to better accommodate folks moving forward.

What metrics can you use to measure office utilization?

As we’ve already covered, a measured approach to improving your office utilization will help you spot inefficiencies, make data-driven adjustments, and optimize your workspace to better meet organizational and employee needs. Now, let’s explore the metrics you should track to reap these benefits.

• Capacity. This is the total number of people your workplace and individual spaces can accommodate. This metric can help you understand how much space is available and inform decisions about whether to reconfigure or expand your office layout.
• Employee and visitor presence. Data on attendance reveals which days and times your workplace is busiest. You can use this information to adjust resources to better match actual demand and to meet the needs of the folks coming into the workplace. For example, the data might show that senior leadership plans to be onsite, prompting you to prepare your larger conference rooms so they can work more effectively. 
• Density. Monitor your space capacity in real time by tracking density. High-density areas may signal a need for more resources or a redesign to prevent overcrowding. On the flip side, low-density areas may need to be repurposed to meet employee needs.
• Peak usage times. Data on the times of day or week when office spaces are busiest helps you schedule and manage resources more effectively. It can also help you spot areas that may need adjustments to handle high traffic or improve overall efficiency.
• Desk and room utilization. This measures how often desks and meeting rooms are used relative to their total capacity. You can use this information to identify crowded and underused spaces that may need to be reconfigured to improve utilization.
• Space type utilization. Data on how different areas (e.g., collaborative spaces, quiet zones, and break rooms) are used can help you understand how employees interact with each space and guide design improvements.
• Booking versus actual usage. This compares how often meeting rooms and desks are booked versus how often they’re actually used. You can use this data to spot any mismatches and adjust resource allocation to better meet actual needs.
• Employee feedback. Input directly from employees about their workspace experience provides insights into specific pain points or preferences. This feedback can help you make more informed adjustments to improve the workspace.

3 tips for improving your workplace utilization

1. Choose employee-friendly workplace tools

If the tools are user-friendly and intuitive, employees are more likely to use them consistently. This helps you gather accurate data on space usage, attendance, and resource allocation. Think mobile apps for booking desks, checking into a meeting room with a single tap, and automatically signing into to the workplace by connecting to the Wi-Fi. The more your team engages with these tools, the more data you collect, leading to smarter workplace design decisions.

2. Look for a workplace platform that can centralize your data

Unlike single-purpose software tools, a centralized workplace platform saves you the hassle of manually collecting data from different sources and ensures that your decisions are based on accurate, up-to-date information. With your workplace data in one place, you can quickly identify trends and make adjustments to improve efficiency and space utilization.

3. Ask your employees for feedback

Data is king, but it works best when paired with insights from your team. Seek employee feedback about their workplace experience, preferences, and any issues they encounter. This helps you understand the context behind the data, making it easier to address specific concerns and make informed improvements to the workplace. Below are some questions you might ask them. 

• What draws you to work onsite?
• What space types do you need to be productive while onsite?
• What do you enjoy most about being in the workplace? Least?

How Envoy can help improve your office utilization

While 96% of companies have access to workplace data, most have to go to great lengths to collect it manually. This is time-consuming and often leads to incomplete or incorrect analysis. In fact, nearly half of workplace leaders admit it takes them one or more days to gather data from disparate sources—and that’s just so they can analyze it. 

Envoy’s workplace platform ensures your space data is accurate and gathered in a single place, making it easier for you to make decisions that improve your space. Let’s look at a few ways you can leverage Envoy to make the most of your workplace. 

Unified analytics

Envoy consolidates data from workplace integrations and employee and visitor check-ins into a unified view of your workplace utilization, so you don’t have to do it manually. This frees you up to focus on the analysis and ensures you always make decisions based on accurate data. 

Better space planning and forecasting

With Envoy, you can make booking space onsite quick and simple. Every time your employees use Envoy, you collect more space usage data to drive decision-making. These include:

• Room booking. Understand important meeting room usage metrics, such as your most popular rooms, room bookings by day, utilization by room capacity, and cancellations. 
• Hot desking. Access key desk utilization data, including employee usage, team usage, and location. 
• Occupancy data. Gain insight into onsite attendance. You can sort this data by weekly attendance, department attendance, attendance frequency, and no-shows. 

Automated space solutions

Envoy also enables you to automatically free up unused space so you can make better use of your workplace. Here are some of the automated features that can help you save space: 

• Room resizer. Automatically prompt employees to downsize their room when a smaller one is available. This frees up larger rooms for bigger groups and ensures everyone onsite can find a space that meets their needs.
• Auto-release. Reduce “ghost” rooms, rooms that are booked but go unused, by automatically releasing them if no one checks in after five minutes. This helps to maximize room utilization and improve overall efficiency.
• Recurring meeting clean-up. Release rooms tied to recurring meetings if three consecutive check-ins are missed. Envoy will automatically remove the room from the calendar, reducing the occurrence of “ghost” rooms by making it available for others to book.

A better workplace experience

Finally, to gather the data you need to improve the workplace, employees need to use your workplace platform. Envoy is designed to be employee-friendly, so folks want to use it to navigate their day onsite. Employees can use the Envoy mobile app to coordinate schedules, book meeting rooms, and reserve a desk onsite. 

They can also tap to check into a room from a sleek tablet located outside of the space. The more they use Envoy, the richer the insights you'll gain, creating an environment where employees are more likely to want to work.

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Space utilization is a key part of managing your workplace and should be prioritized. By taking a measured approach, you can make better use of your space, reduce wasted areas, and encourage employees to come into—and stay—in the workplace.

Ready to dive deeper into how Envoy can help you run a more efficient workplace? Visit our website to learn more.