Successful human resources management is one of the keys to business success: this is borne out by numerous international studies. Workplace design and job security, alongside numerous other factors, are core elements that contribute to employee satisfaction. However, as many HR planners are aware: It is becoming increasingly difficult to find suitable staff – this is due, amongst other things, to demographic trends in most industrialised countries, where low birth rates are creating gaps in certain age groups; but also to the increasingly specialised skill sets required in the modern world of work.
Furthermore, most employees are very reluctant to give up their homes and relocate if the dynamics of their employer’s business development make this necessary – particularly if they have already started families and do not want to take their children away from their familiar surroundings of nursery, schools, circle of friends or clubs. For many, working at a business centre is a solution, as Dr André Helf, CEO of the COLLECTION Business Centre Group, explains: “We are constantly finding that many of our clients are decentralising. Thanks to digitalisation and modern communication options, this is often no problem: video conferences are increasingly replacing tedious meetings, memos are, of course, sent by email, and documents are signed and scanned. The corporate policy of short commutes is gaining significant momentum as a strategic development, not least for reasons of cost-effectiveness. It is therefore entirely possible, for example, for a senior manager to continue living in Düsseldorf, even if their employer is carrying out an important project in more distant cities such as Hamburg or Stuttgart. Our state-of-the-art business centres offer every facility for employees to participate in business activities – without them having to endure constant, cumbersome travel or even relocate.”
And even if an employee’s physical presence on site is required – for instance, for client relations, project supervision or during test phases – COLLECTION Business Centres are available at two locations in Düsseldorf, as well as one each in Hamburg, Stuttgart, Vienna and Frankfurt. A brand-new business centre is expected to open in Cologne in the third quarter of next year, and another will open in Hamburg on 1 January 2020 – with further European cities already in the planning stage. “In our Business Centres, companies have the opportunity to set up temporary external hubs – there is no long-term lease commitment, so they can establish a presence in remote locations for as long as necessary to develop and carry out projects at the customer’s site. Employees can then use this location for as long as necessary without having to relocate entirely. This does not hinder corporate mobility, and staff motivation is not compromised by the risk of having to uproot their families,” explains Dr Helf.
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